CECILIA   INGLES. 


[See  page  2=6.] 


THE  CLIFF-DWELLERS 


H 


BY 


HENRY   B.  FULLER 


ILLUSTRATED  BY  T.  DE  THULSTRUP 


NEW    YORK 

HARPER    &    BROTHERS    PUBLISHERS 
1893 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


CECILIA  INGLES «     ^    .-.     .  Frontispiece. 

'"WE  ARE  LIVING  UP  ON  PINE  STREET*"     .      .  Facing  p.  10 

"TWO  YOUNG  GIRLS  ENTERED" "  23 

"'I  SHALL  MARRY  RUSSELL,'  SHE  DECLARED".  "  44 
4 '  A  DOOR  OPENED  SUDDENLY,  AND  HER  BROTHER 

BURT  CAME  IN" "  58 

"HE  FOUND  A  PLACE  IN  A  QUIET  CORNER"  .  "  62 
"'WE  HAVE  COME  TO  TAKE  OUR  GIRL  BACK 

HOME'".    «..«.....    .....-..-,>  "  84 

"'ISN'T  IT  PRETTY  LATE  FOR  DOLLY?'"    .  ...  "  •     92 

"  *  HOW'S  THIS,  JO  ?'  ASKED  OGDEN  ".."".'.  "  110 
"  BHE  LAID  HER  HAND  TREMBLINGLY  UPON  THE 

OLD  MAN'S  ARM"     ....    .1.'.    ..-"-*'  122 

"HE  LOOKED  STEADILY  ON  VIBERT  FROM  UNDER 

HIS  HAND". "  130 

"THE  GIRL  GATE  HIM  A  GLANCE  WILD  AND 

TIMID" "  148 

"THE  MATTER  WAS  ADJUSTED  IN  A  SMALL  AND 

COMPACT  COURT-ROOM" "  160 

"  '  HERE  WE  GO/  SHE  CRIED,  '  SUNDAY  OH  NO 

SUNDAY.  I  HATE  TO  POKE'"  .  "  176 


Copyright,  1893,  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS. 
All  rights  reserved. 

LOAN  STACK 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


CECILIA  INGLES Frontispiece, 

'"WE  ARE  LIVING  UP  ON  PINE  STREET'"  .  .  Facing  p.  Ify 

"TWO  YOUNG  GIRLS  ENTERED" "  22 

"'I  SHALL  MARRY  RUSSELL,'  SHE  DECLARED".  "  44 
' '  A  DOOR  OPENED  SUDDENLY,  AND  HER  BROTHER 

BURT  CAME  IN" "  58 

"HE  FOUND  A  PLACE  IN  A  QUIET  CORNER"  .  "  62 
"'WE  HAVE  COME  TO  TAKE  OUR  GIRL  BACK 

HOME'" "  84 

"'ISN'T  IT  PRETTY  LATE  FOR  DOLLY?'"  .  .  "  92 

"'HOW'S  THIS,  JO?'  ASKED  OGDEN  "  ....  "  110 
"SHE  LAID  HER  HAND  TREMBLINGLY  UPON  THE 

OLD  MAN'S  ARM" "  122 

"HE  LOOKED  STEADILY  ON  VIBERT  FROM  UNDER 

HIS  HAND" "  130 

"THE  GIRL  GAVE  HIM  A  GLANCE  WILD  AND 

TIMID" "  148 

"THE  MATTER  WAS  ADJUSTED  IN  A  SMALL  AND 

COMPACT  COURT-ROOM" "  160 

"  'HERE  WE  GO/  SHE  CRIED,  'SUNDAY  OR  NO 

SUNDAY.  I  HATE  TO  POKE'"  .  "176 


THEY    SAT   OUT   NOW   ONLY  AFTER    DA11K  "      .    Facing  p.  186 
HE   SAT   WITH   HIS   EYES 'FIXED   ON   THE   BOT 
TOM  OF  THE  BOAT" "         206 

BUBT   LED   CORNELIA   DOWN   THE   AISLE".       .  "            212 

'now  WELL  IT'S  DONE  !'  SHE  SAID  TO  HIM".  "        226 
'GOODNESS,  GEORGE,  DON'T  KNOCK  THE  FIRE 

ALL  TO  PIECES!'" .     .  "        252 

'IS  HE  DEAD?'" "        264 

'  THEN  SHE  FELL  BACK  WEAKLY  AND  COUGHED 

LONG  AND  VIOLENTLY  " 280 

1  '  STOP  !'  CRIED  OGDEN  " "       292 

''THREE  TO  ONE,'  PANTED  MARCUS"    .     .     .  306 

;  SHE    PRESSED    HIM    BACK    INTO    THE    DEPTHS 

OF   HIS   GREAT   EASY-CHAIIl "      .       .      .       „      .  ''           322 


THE    CLIFF-DWELLERS 


INTRODUCTION 

BETWEEN  the  former  site  of  old  Fort  Dear 
born  and  the  present  site  of  our  newest  Board 
of  Trade  there  lies  a  restricted  yet  tumultu 
ous  territory  through  which,  during  the  course 
of  the  last  fifty  years,  the  rushing  streams  of 
commerce  have  worn  many  a  deep  and  rugged 
chasm.  These  great  canons — conduits,  in  fact, 
for  the  leaping  volume  of  an  ever -increasing 
prosperity — cross  each  other  with  a  sort  of  sys 
tematic  rectangularity,  and  in  deference  to  the 
practical  directness  of  local  requirements  they 
are  in  general  called  simply — streets.  Each  of 
these  canons  is  closed  in  by  a  long  frontage  of 
towering  cliffs,  and  these  soaring  walls  of  brick 
and  limestone  and  granite  rise  higher  and  higher 
with  each  succeeding  year,  according  as  the  work 
of  erosion  at  their  bases  goes  onward — the  work 
of  that  seething  flood  of  carts,  carriages,  omni 
buses,  cabs,  cars,  messengers,  shoppers,  clerks,  and 
capitalists,  which  surges  with  increasing  violence 
1 


for  every  passing  day.  This  erosion,  proceeding 
with  a  sort  of  fateful  regularity,  has  come  to 
be  a  matter  of  constant  and  growing  interest. 
Means  have  been  found  to  measure  its  progress 
—  just  as  a  scale  has  been  arranged  to  measure 
the  rising  of  the  Nile  or  to  gauge  the  draught 
of  an  ocean  liner.  In  this  case  the  unit  of  meas 
urement  is  called  the  "  story."  Ten  years  ago 
the  most  rushing  and  irrepressible  of  the  tor 
rents  which  devastate  Chicago  had  not  worn  its 
bed  to  a  greater  depth  than  that  indicated  by 
seven  of  these  "  stories."  This  depth  has  since 
increased  to  eight — to  ten — to  fourteen — to  six 
teen,  until  some  of  the  leading  avenues  of  activ 
ity  promise  soon  to  become  little  more  than  mere 
obscure  trails  half  lost  between  the  bases  of  per 
pendicular  precipices. 

High  above  this  architectural  upheaval  rise 
yet  other  structures  in  crag-like  isolation.  El 
Capitan  is  duplicated  time  and  again  both  in 
bulk  and  in  stature,  and  around  him  the  floating 
spray  of  the  Bridal  Yeil  is  woven  by  the  breezes 
of  lake  and  prairie  from  the  warp  of  soot-flakes 
and  the  woof  of  damp-drenched  smoke. 

The  explorer  who  has  climbed  to  the  shoulder 
of  one  of  these  great  captains  and  has  found  one 
of  the  thinnest  folds  in  the  veil  may  readily 
make  out  the  nature  of  the  surrounding  country. 
The  rugged  and  erratic  plateau  of  the  Bad  Lands 
lies  before  him  in  all  its  hideousness  and  im- 


practicability.  It  is  a  wild  tract  full  of  sudden 
falls,  unexpected  rises,  precipitous  dislocations. 
The  high  and  the  low  are  met  together.  The 
big  and  the  little  alternate  in  a  rapid  and  illogi 
cal  succession.  Its  perilous  trails  are  followed 
successfully  by  but  few — by  a  lineman,  perhaps, 
who  is  balanced  on  a  cornice,  by  a  roofer  astride 
some  dizzy  gable,  by  a  youth  here  and  there 
whose  early  apprehension  of  the  main  chance 
and  the  multiplication  table  has  stood  him  in 
good  stead.  This  country  is  a  treeless  country 
—if  we  overlook  the  "  forest  of  chimneys  "  com 
prised  in  a  bird's-eye  view  of  any  great  city,  and 
if  we  are  unable  to  detect  any  botanical  analo 
gies  in  the  lofty  articulated  iron  funnels  whose 
ramifying  cables  reach  out  wherever  they  can, 
to  fasten  wherever  they  may.  It  is  a  shrubless 
country — if  we  give  no  heed  to  the  gnarled  car 
pentry  of  the  awkward  frame-works  which  carry 
the  telegraph,  and  which  are  set  askew  on  such 
dizzy  corners  as  the  course  of  the  wires  may 
compel.  It  is  an  arid  country — if  we  overlook 
the  numberless  tanks  that  squat  on  the  high 
angles  of  alley  wralls,  or  if  we  fail  to  see  the 
little  pools  of  tar  and  gravel  that  ooze  and  shim 
mer  in  the  summer  sun  on  the  roofs  of  old-fash 
ioned  buildings  of  the  humbler  sort.  It  is  an 
airless  country — if  by  air  we  mean  the  mere  com 
bination  of  oxygen  and  nitrogen  which  is  com 
monly  indicated  by  that  ,name.  For  here  the 


medium  of  sight,  sound,  light,  and  life  becomes 
largely  carbonaceous,  and  the  remoter  peaks 
of  this  mighty  yet  unprepossessing  landscape 
loom  up  grandly,  but  vaguely,  through  swath 
ing  mists  of  coal-smoke. 

From  such  conditions  as  these  —  along  with 
the  Tacoma,  the  Monadnock,  and  a  great  host 
of  other  modern  monsters — towers  the  Clifton. 
From  the  beer-hall  in  its  basement  to  the  bar 
ber-shop  just  under  its  roof  the  Clifton  stands 
full  eighteen  stories  tall.  Its  hundreds  of  win 
dows  glitter  with  multitudinous  letterings  in 
gold  and  in  silver,  and  on  summer  afternoons 
its  awnings  flutter  score  on  score  in  the  tepid 
breezes  that  sometimes  come  up  from  Indiana. 
Four  ladder-like  constructions  which  rise  sky 
ward  stage  by  stage,  promote  the  agility  of  the 
clambering  hordes  that  swarm  within  it,  and 
ten  elevators — devices  unknown  to  the  real,  ab 
original  inhabitants — ameliorate  the  daily  cliff- 
climbing  for  the  frail  of  physique  and  the 
pressed  for  time. 

The  tribe  inhabiting  the  Clifton  is  large  and 
rather  heterogeneous.  All  told,  it  numbers 
about  four  thousand  souls.  It  includes  bankers, 
capitalists,  lawyers,  "promoters";  brokers  in 
bonds,  stocks,  pork,  oil,  mortgages  ;  real-estate 
people  and  railroad  people  and  insurance  people 
—  life,  fire,  marine,  accident ;  a  host  of  princi 
pals,  agents,  middlemen,  clerks,  cashiers,  stenog- 


raphers,  and  errand  -  boys ;  and  the  necessary 
force  of  engineers,  janitors,  scrub  -  women,  and 
elevator- hands. 

All  these  thousands  gather  daily  around  their 
own  great  camp-fire.  This  fire  heats  the  four  big 
boilers  under  the  pavement  of  the  court  which 
lies  just  behind,  and  it  sends  aloft  a  vast  plume  of 
smoke  to  mingle  with  those  of  other  like  com 
munities  that  are  settled  round  about.  These 
same  thousands  may  also  gather  —  in  instal 
ments — at  their  tribal  feast,  for  the  Clifton  has 
its  own  lunch-counter  just  off  one  corner  of  the 
grand  court,  as  well  as  a  restaurant  several  floors 
higher  up.  The  members  of  the  tribe  may  also 
smoke  the  pipe  of  peace  among  themselves 
whenever  so  minded,  for  the  Clifton  has  its  own 
cigar -stand  just  within  the  principal  entrance. 
Newspapers  and  periodicals,  too,  are  sold  at  the 
same  place.  The  warriors  may  also  communi 
cate  their  messages,  hostile  or  friendly,  to  chiefs 
more  or  less  remote  ;  for  there  is  a  telegraph 
office  in  the  corridor  and  a  squad  of  messenger- 
boys  in  wait  close  by. 

In  a  word,  the  Clifton  aims  to  be  complete 
within  itself,  and  it  will  be  unnecessary  for  us 
to  go  afield  either  far  or  frequently  during  the 
present  simple  succession  of  brief  episodes  in  the 
lives  of  the  Cliff-dwellers. 


ON  the  tenth  floor  of  the  Clifton  is  the  office 
of  the  Massachusetts  Brass  Company. 

Those  whose  minds  are  attuned  to  an  apprecia 
tion  of  upholstery  and  kindred  matters  pronounce 
this  little  suite  the  gem  of  the  whole  establish 
ment.  Even  many  who  are  not  adepts  in  the 
matter  of  house-furnishing,  and  who  are  much  too 
rushed  and  preoccupied  to  become  such,  have 
been  known  to  pause  in  their  course  through 
the  Clifton's  long  corridors,  on  occasions  when 
the  ribbed  glass  door  of  the  Brass  Company 
happened  to  be  standing  ajar,  and  to  say  to 
themselves,  with  certain  home  offices  in  mind, 

"  Now,  why  can't  our  people  do  as  much  for 

UB?" 

Indeed,  there  is  cause  enough  for  envy  in  that 
small  square  of  velvety  Axminster,  in  the  har 
monious  tinting  of  the  walls,  in  the  padded 
leather  backs  of  the  swivel  chairs,  in  the  pol 
ished  brightness  of  the  cherry  desk-tops,  in  the 
fresh  blotting-pads  and  the  immaculate  ink 
stands.  To  sit  in  this  pleasant  little  apartment 
for  half  an  hour  is  to  receive  quite  a  new  impres 
sion  of  the  possible  luxury  of  business,  the  ulti- 


mate  elegance  of  trade.  This  may  be  managed 
as  easily  as  not  if  you  happen  to  have  any  deal 
ings  with  "D.  Walworth  Floyd,  Agt." — accord 
ing  to  the  legend  on  the  translucent  pane  of  the 
door — who  is  quite  unlikely  to  hurry  you  out  be 
fore  you  have  finished. 

"  Don't  be  in  such  a  drive,"  he  will  perhaps 
say  to  you  ;  "  stay  and  smoke  a  cigar." 

For  business  is  not  too  exacting  a  considera 
tion  with  the  western  branch  of  the  Massachu 
setts  Brass  Company.  It  is  less  a  hive  of  indus 
try  than  a  social  exchange.  The  hours  are  easy, 
and  the  habitues  are  as  frequently  callers  as  cus 
tomers.  They  are  often  Jacks  or  Toms,  whose 
fathers  are  social  pillars  in  Boston  and  large 
land-owners  in  Wyoming  and  Dakota,  and  Jack 
and  Tom — birds  of  passage  in  Scotch  cheviots 
and  billycock  hats — are  given  to  alighting  for  a 
brief  breathing  -  spell  on  this  lofty  perch,  where 
they  reproach  the  slipshod  dress  and  careless 
speech  of  their  friend's  small  office  force  by  the 
trim  neatness  of  their  own  clothes  and  conversa 
tion. 

It  may  be  guessed  that  this  snug  haven  of  ref 
uge  has  been  established  and  maintained  less  to 
extend  the  Company's  trade  than  to  provide  a 
]  tlace  for  the  Company's  Walworth.  I  say  Com 
pany's  Walworth,  for  in  this  case  " company" 
and  "family"  are  interchangeable  terms.  The 
Massachusetts  Brass  Company  is  the  Floyd  fam- 


ily,  and  the  "Floyd  family  is  the  Massachusetts 
Brass  Company.  The  Company  pays  no  divi 
dends,  but  it  is  very  generous  in  its  salaries.  It 
is  liberal  with  Hosea  G.  Floyd,  who  is  its  presi 
dent,  and  with  Winthrop  C.  Floyd,  who  is  its 
treasurer,  and  with  H.  Lovell  Floyd,  who  is  its 
JSTew  York  agent,  and  with  Cadwallader  P. 
Floyd,  who  looks  after  the  Philadelphia  inter 
ests  ;  nor  does  it  quite  forget  D.  Walworth 
Floyd,  who  holds  up  one  end  more  or  less  effect 
ively  in  the  West.  But  "Walworth  is  the  last 
and  the  youngest  of  the  Floyds;  his  marriage 
was  not  to  the  complete  satisfaction  of  his  fam 
ily,  and  his  single  independent  venture  before 
leaving  home,  in  the  direction  of  coffee  and 
spices,  compelled  his  brothers  to  put  their  hands 
into  their  pockets  rather  deeply.  So,  while  the 
rest  of  the  Floyds  think  that,  all  considered,  they 
have  rather  done  the  fair  thing  by  Walworth, 
yet  Walworth,  on  the  other  hand,  regards  his 
assignment  to  the  West  as  a  mild  form  of  pun 
ishment  and  exile. 

"  It  does  give  me  a  little  elbow-room,  though." 
This  is  the  silent  acknowledgment  that  Wal 
worth  sometimes  makes  to  himself — but  grudg 
ingly. 

Walworth  Floyd  is  a  sleek,  well-fed,  prosper 
ous-looking  fellow  of  thirty.  His  figure  is  a 
trifle  too  short  and  dumpy  to  be  pronounced  ab 
solutely  good ;  but  it  is  always  strikingly  well- 


dressed — for  he  has  lived  in  the  West  hardly  a 
year  as  yet.  His  face  is  not  handsome,  but  it  is 
gentlemanly  quite.  One  might,  indeed,  complain 
of  the  retreating  lines  of  his  forehead,  and  re 
gret,  too,  that  his  chin,  once  perfect,  now  shows 
leanings  towards  the  duplex;  but,  on  the  other 
hand,  his  well-bridged  nose,  you  are  sure,  has 
been  figuring  in  family  portraits  for  the  last 
hundred  years,  and  his  plump  hands,  by  reason 
of  the  fine  texture  of  the  skin  and  the  shapeli 
ness  of  the  nails,  form  a  point  that  is  distinctly 
aristocratic.  Yet  penmanship,  under  his  manipu 
lations,  becomes  a  very  crabbed  and  laborious 
affair,  and  this  light  species  of  manual  labor  is 
usually  performed,  so  far  as  he  is  concerned,  by 
other  hands.  He  has  a  sort  of  general  clerk,  and 
he  shares  the  services  of  a  stenographer  with  two 
or  three  of  his  neighbors.  He  employs,  too,  an 
office-boy,  who  would  idle  away  a  good  deal  of 
time  if  Walworth  were  not  in  the  habit  of  send 
ing  frequent  communications  to  the  steward  of 
his  club.  Walworth,  garmented  in  his  plump 
placidity,  has  been  accustomed  to  fare  sumptu 
ously  every  day,  and  to  worry  his  head  about  as 
few  things  as  possible.  His  dining  he  does  for 
himself  ;  his  thinking  he  has  somebody  else  do 
for  him.  His  book-keeping  and  auditing  and  so 
on  are  done  in  .the  East,  and  a  friend  of  his — he 
has  no  enemies — once  said  that  his  stomach  was 
in  Chicago,  while  his  brains  were  in  Boston. 


10 


"Walworth,  considering  his  family  training  and 
traditions,  is  inexplicably  expansive.  Even  more 
than  his  limited  capabilities  for  business,  even 
more  than  the  exactions  of  a  wife  whose  pinched 
girlhood  has  helped  her  to  a  full  appreciation  of 
her  present  membership  in  a  wealthy  family,  has 
his  own  open-hearted  bonhomie  "kept  him  back." 
He  is  just  the  man  to  whom  one  writes  a  letter 
of  introduction  without  any  sense  of  imposing  a 
burden,  or  to  whom  one  may  present  it  without 
experiencing  any  great  sense  of  embarrassment. 
And  it  is  a  letter  of  introduction,  in  point  of 
fact,  which  is  now  lying  half  folded  on  the  ex 
tended  elbow-rest  of  his  desk,  and  has  been  lying 
there  for  a  quarter  of  an  hour. 

Most  of  us  know  something  about  letters  of 
introduction — promised  so  thoughtlessly,  written 
so  glibly,  presented  so  reluctantly,  received  so 
grudgingly.  But  when  the  letter  is  merely  a 
trifling  and  insignificant  line — a  line  which  has 
no  great  importance  for  the  bearer  and  can  cause 
no  great  annoyance  to  the  recipient — and  when 
its  presentation  here  and  its  accounting  for  there 
may  be  considered  as  but  a  minute  item  in  the 
general  system  of  social  book-keeping,  then  we 
have  an  episode  that  passes  quickly  and  lightly 
for  all  concerned.  Such  appears  to  be  the  situa 
tion  in  the  office  of  the  Massachusetts  Brass  Com 
pany. 

Wai  worth  is  .tilted  back  comfortably  in  one  of 


11 


his  handsome  chairs  and  sends  out  a  casual 
glance  through  the  nearest  window.  The  sun 
is  struggling  with  a  half -luminous  haze,  and 
through  this  haze  a  hundred  streaks  of  smoke 
are  driving  headlong  towards  the  lake.  A  tall 
clock-tower  looms  up  three  or  four  streets  away, 
and  one  of  its  faces  —  on  the  looker's  own  level 
— gives  the  hour  as  half -past  ten. 

"Well,  we  are  living  up  on  Pine  Street,  Mr. 
Ogden,"  he  is  saying ;  "  just  this  side  of  the 
Water  Works — the  place  where  the  '  wheels  go 
round,'  you  know.  You  beat  me  here  by  a  few 
minutes  this  morning,  but  I  think  I  can  promise 
to  be  the  first  on  the  ground  when  you  call  on 
us  there." 

He  is  running  his  fingers  over  the  edges  of 
several  little  sheets  of  brass.  A  few  bunches  of 
these,  together  with  a  set  or  two  of  brass  rings 
of  varying  diameters  and  thicknesses,  are  the 
only  intimations  of  merchandise  that  the  office 
yields.  Sometimes  even  these  are  bundled  away 
into  a  drawer,  and  then  commerce  is  refined  com 
pletely  beyond  the  ken  of  the  senses. 

"  However,  don't  go.  I  am  a  little  late  in  get 
ting  around  this  morning,  but  the  mail  is  light. 
Ferguson  will  look  after  it.  Sit  down  again." 

The  visitor,  thus  urged,  sank  back  into  the 
chair  from  which  he  had  just  risen.  He  was  a 
slender  young  man,  of  good  height,  and  his  age 
was  perhaps  twenty -four.  His  complexion  was 


12 


of  the  colorless  kind  that  good  health  alone 
keeps  from  sallowness.  His  hair  was  a  light 
brown  and  fine  and  thick,  and  it  fell  across  his 
temples  in  the  two  smooth  wings  that  were  made 
by  an  accurate  parting  in  the  middle.  He  had 
the  beginnings  of  a  shadowy  little  moustache, 
and  a  pair  of  good  eyes  which  expressed  a  fair 
amount  of  self-reliance  and  any  amount  of  hope. 

"  And  how  are  you  finding  the  West  Side  ?" 
Walworth  pursued.  "  I  don't  know  much  about 
it  myself.  This  is  a  big  town  and  awfully  cut 
up.  A  man  has  to  pick  out  his  own  quarter  and 
stick  to  it.  If  you  move  from  one  side  of  the 
river  to  another,  you  bid  good-by  to  all  your  old 
friends;  you  never  see  them  again.  You  said 
you  were  somewhere  near  Union  Park,  I  be 
lieve?" 

"  Yes,"  George  Ogden  answered,  "  I  have  land 
ed  in  a  pretty  good  place,  and  I  want  to  stay 
there  if  I  can.  They're  a  sort  of  farming  people 
—or  were,  to  start  with.  They  came  from  New 
York  State,  I  believe,  and  haven't  been  here  but 
a  year  or  two.  Is  there  anybody  in  this  town 
who  hasn't  come  from  somewhere  else,  or  who 
has  been  here  more  than  a  year  or  two  ?" 

Walworth  laughed.  "/  haven't.  But  you 
go  around  some,  and  you  may  find  a  few  that 
have." 

"  The  mother  cooks,  the  father  markets,  the 
daughter  helps  to  wait  on  table.  Nice,  friendly 


13 


people;  make  me  think  of  those  at  home."  He 
smiled  a  little  wistfully.  "  About  the  only  peo 
ple  so  far  that  do." 

"  Well,  I  have  heard  that  there  are  some  pret 
ty  good  streets  over  there,"  is  Walworth's  vague 
response. 

"  Ours  is.  We  have  trees — all  of  one  sort  and 
planted  regularly,  I  mean.  And  ornamental 
lamp -posts.  And  I'm  only  a  block  from  the 
Park.  Everything  seems  all  right  enough." 

"  I  dare  say ;  but  don't  you  find  it  rather  far 
away  from —  ?"  queried  Floyd,  with  a  sort  of  in 
sinuating  intentness. 

However,  I  have  no  idea  of  reproducing  Wai- 
worth's  remarks  on  the  local  topography.  They 
were  voluminous,  but  he  would  be  found  prej 
udiced  and  but  partly  informed.  Besides,  his 
little  tirade  was  presently  thrown  out  of  joint 
by  a  dislocating  interruption. 

Walworth  always  experienced  a  mental  dislo 
cation,  slight  or  serious,  whenever  his  wife  called 
at  the  office.  Nor  were  matters  much  helped 
when  his  wife  was  accompanied  by  her  sister. 
It  was  the  latter  of  these  who  now  opened  the 
door  with  an  assured  hand  and  who  shut  it 
after  the  two  of  them  with  a  confirmatory 
slam. 

"  Yes,  here  we  are,"  she  seemed  to  imply. 

In  Mrs.  Walworth  Floyd  our  young  man  met 
a  lean  and  anxious  little  body,  who  appeared 


14 


strenuous  and  exacting  and  of  the  kind  who,  as 
the  expression  goes,  are  hard  to  get  along  with. 
She  had  a  sharp  little  nose  and  a  pair  of  inquis 
itorial  eyes.  She  was  dressed  richly,  but  as 
simply  as  a  sword  in  its  scabbard.  If  Wai  worth 
spent  an  evening  abroad  it  was  a  fair  assumption 
that  his  wife  knew  where  he  was  and  all  about 
it.  Otherwise  the  sword  was  drawn. 

"We  have  been  almost  three  quarters  of  an 
hour  getting  here,"  she  said  in  a  tense  way. 
"  Something  was  the  matter  with  the  cable  and 
they  kept  us  in  the  tunnel  nearly  twenty  min 
utes.  As  I  tell  Ann,  you  can  always  count  on 
that  sort  of  thing  when  you've  got  anything  of 
real  importance  on  hand  and  not  much  time  for 
it.  And  yet  we  talk  about  the  jams  and  delays 
in  Tremont  Street !" 

She  drew  down  her  mouth  and  blinked  her 
eyes  indignantly.  She  felt  all  the  shortcomings 
of  her  new  home  very  keenly ;  she  made  every 
one  of  them  a  personal  affront. 

"  Ann  thought  it  was  amusing.  Perhaps  it 
won't  seem  so  after  it  has  happened  to  her  three 
or  four  times  more." 

Walworth  glanced  apprehensively  in  the  di 
rection  of  his  sister-in-law's  chair.  She  was  un 
derstood  to  be  in  his  house  on  a  brief  visit.  He 
trusted  that  she  was  not  to  be  exposed  a  second 
time  to  so  annoying  an  accident. 

Ann  Wilde  was  a  stout  woman  who  was  near- 


15 


ing  forty.  Her  appearance  indicated  that,  while 
she  had  not  escaped  the  buffets  of  the  world, 
yet  her  past  experiences  had  only  seasoned  and 
toughened  her  for  her  future  ones.  In  this  earth 
ly  turmoil  of  give  and  take  she  seemed  to  have 
played  a  full  inning  on  each  side.  She  had  be 
gun  as  a  poetess,  she  had  gone  on  as  a  boarding- 
house  keeper,  and  she  was  now  ready  to  take 
her  first  step  as  an  investor.  To  turn  from  liter 
ature  to  lodgings  indicates  talent ;  to  do  so  well 
in  lodgings  as  to  have  funds  for  the  purchase  of 
property  indicates  genius.  Miss  Wi]de,  at  four 
teen,  was  a  plain  child  whose  straggling  hair 
was  drawn  back  from  her  forehead  by  an  india- 
rubber  comb  that  passed  over  the  top  of  her 
head  from  ear  to  ear,  and  she  was  called  Annie. 
At  seventeen,  conscious  of  the  first  flutterings 
of  sentiment  and  prompted  by  indications  of 
increasing  comeliness,  she  re-named  herself  An 
nette.  At  twenty,  somewhat  disappointed  in  the 
promise  of  beauty,  yet  consoled  in  some  degree 
by  a  spreading  reputation  as  a  versifier,  she 
changed  her  name  to  Anne.  At  twenty-six,  as 
the  result  of  a  disappointment  in  an  affair  of  the 
heart  and  of  a  growing  appreciation  of  the  mod 
esty  of  her  social  role,  she  resignedly  styled  her 
self  Anna.  And  at  thirty-five,  fully  convinced 
of  her  own  hopeless  plainness,  of  the  completely 
practical  cast  of  things  generally,  and  of  the 
uselessness  of  flying  the  flag  of  idealism  any 


16 


longer,  she  bobbed  off  at  the  same  time  both  her 
hair  and  her  name ;  she  presented  a  short  -  cut 
poll  of  frizzled  gray  and  she  signed  herself  Ann. 
What's  in  a  name  ?  Sometimes  nothing ;  some 
times  a  whole  biography. 

"  I  have  been  telling  Mr.  Ogden,"  said  Wai- 
worth,  "  that  he  ought  to  be  in  our  part  of  town 
— he  ought  to  be  one  of  our  little  circle."  His 
wife  looked  up  rather  coldly;  her  little  circle 
was  not  open  to  any  new  candidate  that  the  un- 
calculating  good-nature  of  her  husband  might 
propose.  "  That  house  around  on  Eush  Street 
could  take  him  in,  I  imagine.  And  all  the  people 
he  will  want  to  know  are  right  around  there. 
Why,  you  have  been  in  Worcester,  Frances; 
you  know  the  Parkers.  Well,  Mrs.  Parker  is 
Mr.  Ogden's  aunt  —  aunt,  I  think  you  said  ?— 
yes,  aunt ;  so  you  see  about  how  it  is.  Always 
glad  to  welcome  one  more  Eastern  pilgrim  to 
our  little  what -you -may -call -it  —  oasis,  you 
know." 

"  Why  didn't  you  say  Mr.  Ogden  was  from  the 
East,  Walworth  ?"  asked  his  wife,  taxingly,  and 
looked  at  the  young  man  for  the  first  time. 

Her  gaze  was  critical,  but  not  forbidding. 

"  Yes,  most  of  us  are  on  the  North  Side,"  she 
observed. 

"  Ogden  is  as  good  as  a  neighbor  already," 
Walworth  went  on,  perseveringly ;  "  a  business 
neighbor.  He  is  going  into  the  Underground 


17 


National.  Letters  and  all  that,  you  know. 
Pretty  good  for  three  weeks,  I  call  it.  If  most 
of  our  fellows  who  come  out  here  did  as  well  in 
three  months  it  would  be  money  in  Mrs.  Floyd's 
pocket.  To  think  of  the  fives  and  tens  and 
twenties  that  have  gone  to  old  schoolmates  of 
Win's  and  to  fellows  who  knew  Lovell  when  he 
was  on  the  road !" 

Ogden  flushed  a  little  and  took  the  first  step 
towards  a  frown.  It  is  not  pleasant  to  contem 
plate  your  possible  inclusion  in  the  reprehensible 
class  of  the  strapped  and  the  stranded,  nor  to 
feel  that  only  a  lucky  letter  of  recommendation 
has  saved  a  friend's  wife  from  being  crossed  in 
some  caprice  or  balked  in  some  whim.  But 
Floyd,  although  cordial  and  liberal,  was  not  in 
variably  fine. 

"  They  stop  me  on  the  street,  and  they  button 
hole  me  in  the  hotels,  and  you  can't  think  how 
many  of  them  come  right  here.  Of  course,  I 
always  do  what  I  can.  But  how  do  they  find 
me  out  ?  And  why  is  it  that  when  I  am  going 
up  home  late  over  the  viaduct  and  somebody  is 
hanging  about  to  strike  some  man  for  a  quarter, 
I  am  always  the  man  to  be  struck  ?  One  or  two 
of  them  have  actually  paid  me  back,  but — 

"Who?"  asked  his  sister-in-law.  She  had  a 
loud,  rasping  voice.  "  The  men  on  the  via 
duct  ?" 

"  The  others,"  Wai  worth  indicated  briefly. 
2 


18 

"  You  are  too  generous,"  said  Ogden.  What 
a  position  for  a  man  who  was  not  to  enter  upon 
an  engagement  to-morrow !  And  what  might 
three  months  be,  if  judged  by  the  hopes  and 
fears  and  expectations  and  disappointments  of 
his  three  weeks ! 

"  The  Underground  ?"  repeated  Mrs.  Floyd, 
turning  towards  her  husband.  "  Isn't  that 
Mayme  Brainard's  father's  bank?"  she  asked  in 
a  general  way. 

"  Mr.  Brainard  is  the  president,"  assented  Og 
den,  with  a  severe  smile.  "  I  addressed  myself 
to  the  cashier,"  he  added  shortly. 

"I  was  sure  I  had  heard  of  it,"  she  rejoined, 
with  a  glacial  graciousness. 

"  Well,  if  you  have  heard  of  it,  my  dear,"  her 
husband  joked,  "how  widely  known  it  must 
be !  You  ought  to  have  heard  of  it ;  you've  had 
enough  checks  on  it,  I'm  sure !" 

But  Mrs.  Floyd  did  not  pursue  the  subject. 
She  looked  at  her  sister  with  that  prim  serious 
ness  which  means  something  on  the  mind — or  on 
two  minds — and  her  sister  returned  the  look  in 
kind ;  and  they  both  looked  in  the  same  fashion 
back  and  forth  between  Walworth  and  his  caller. 
Ann  Wilde  snapped  the  catch  of  her  hand-bag 
once  or  twice,  and  glanced  between  times  at 
some  loose  papers  inside  it.  Ferguson,  in  the 
other  room,  thought  he  perceived  the  approach 
of  a  domestic  crisis  —  a  disputed  dress-maker's 


19 


bill,  perhaps.  Yet  there  might  be  other  reasons. 
He  knew  that  the  cook  was  sometimes  imperti 
nent,  and  that  the  market-man  now  and  then 
forgot  to  send  the  white-fish.  He  himself  was 
a  mere  boarding  bachelor,  yet  he  had  come  to 
learn  something  of  the  relief  which  follows  the 
shifting  of  a  housekeeper's  cares  to  the  shoul 
ders  of  the  housekeeper's  husband.  Ferguson 
had  relieved  the  tedium  of  many  a  half-hour  by 
short-handing  bits  of  dialogue  that  accompanied 
connubial  spats  between  his  employer  and  his 
employer's  wife. 

These  signs  and  tokens  were  not  lost  on  Og- 
den ;  he  rose  again  to  go.  Nor  were  they  lost 
on  Floyd  himself,  whose  apprehension  of  a  bad 
quarter  of  an  hour  was  heightened  by  the  ab 
sence,  as  yet,  of  any  exact  data.  He  had  no 
wish  to  hold  the  field  alone,  and  he  begged  Og- 
den  not  to  hurry  his  departure. 

"  Where  are  the  girls  ?"  he  asked  his  wife.  "  I 
thought  you  said  they  came  along  with  you." 

"  They  did.  They  are  in  the  building.  They 
will  be  up  in  a  few  minutes.  That  child ! — some 
body  ought  to  look  after  her." 

"  Then  why  not  wait  a  little  while  ?"  Floyd 
suggested  to  Ogden.  "My  wife's  affair  won't 
take  long.  Ferguson,  won't  you  just  clear  off 
that  chair  out  there  and  find  the  paper?  And 
now,  what  is  it  ?"  he  asked  the  two  women  Avhen 
they  were  left  together. 


II 

"  WELL,  Ann  has  heard  from  those  Minneapo 
lis  people  again.  And  she  isn't  any  nearer  mak 
ing  up  her  mind  than  before." 

"Here's  what  they  say,"  added  his  sister-in- 
law.  She  took  a  letter  out  of  her  bag  and  hand 
ed  it  to  him. 

"  Oh !"  said  Walworth.  He  felt  half  relieved, 
half  vexed. 

His  wife  stood  by  the  window,  rubbing  her 
forefinger  along  the  edges  of  its  silver  lettering. 

"I  don't  see  whatever  put  Minneapolis  into 
Ann's  head.  There  seems  to  be  a  plenty  of 
buildings  right  here." 

She  looked  at  the  rough  brick  back  of  a  tow 
ering  structure  a  few  hundred  feet  away,  and  at 
the  huddle  of  lower  roofs  between.  From  a  sky 
light  on  one  of  these  a  sunbeam  came  reflected, 
and  compelled  her  to  move. 

"  And  plenty  of  dirt,  too,  if  she  is  after  real 
estate;  plenty  to  be  sold,  and  plenty  of  people 
to  sell  it.  I  never  saw  a  town  where  it  was  more 
plentiful." 

She  glanced  downwards  at  the  wagons  and 
cars  that  were  splashing  through  the  streets  af- 


21 


ter  a  rainy  September  night.  "Why  shouldn't 
there  be  more  people  to  shovel  it,  too  ?  You  see 
their  signs  stuck  up  everywhere — the  dealers,  I 
mean." 

"Ann  can  get  to  Minneapolis  in  thirteen 
hours,"  suggested  Walworth,  passing  the  end 
of  his  thumb  along  one  of  his  eyebrows. 
"What's  that,  after  the  trip  West?  And  then 
she  can  see  for  herself.  You  take  the  cars  here 
late  in  the  afternoon,  and  you  get  there  in  time 
for  breakfast." 

"  I  believe  I'd  just  let  it  drop,"  said  Miss  Wilde, 
"  if  I  happened  to  know  positively  of  any  good 
thing  here.  They  write  a  nice  enough  letter, 
but  I  can't  tell  what  state  the  building  is  in  un 
less  I  see  it.  And  I'm  merely  taking  their  word 
that  the  ground  is  worth  a  hundred  and  fifty. 
There's  forty  feet.  I  wonder  if  'all  improve 
ments  in'  means  that  the  street  is  paved." 

"  Drop  it,  anyway,"  said  her  sister,  as  if  she 
were  disembarrassing  herself  of  some  loathsome 
parcel.  "  Look  around  in  Chicago  itself.  You 
can  see  what  you  are  buying,  then.  Even  if  you 
do  invest  here,  you  are  not  compelled  to  live 
here."  She  became  almost  rigid  in  her  disdain. 

"  Ah— um !"  murmured  Walworth,  in  a  non 
committal  way. 

The  door  opened  suddenly,  and  two  young 
girls  entered  in  a  brisk  fashion.  The  first  one 
had  a  slight  figure,  a  little  above  the  average 


22 

height.  To-day  people  called  her  slender;  six 
or  eight  years  later  they  would  be  likely  to  call 
her  lean.  She  had  long,  thin  arms,  and  delicate, 
transparent  hands.  She  had  large  eyes  of  a  deep 
blue,  and  the  veins  were  plainly  outlined  on  her 
pale  temples.  She  had  a  bright  face  and  a  lively 
manner,  and  seemed  to  be  one  who  drew  largely 
on  her  nervous  force  without  making  deposits  to 
— keep  up  her  account.  Her  costume  was  such  as 
to  give  one  the  idea  that  dress  was  an  important 
matter  with  her. 

"Well,  Frankie!"  she  called  to  Mrs.  Floyd, 
"  you  found  your  way  here  all  right,  did  you  ? 
You're  a  clever  little  body  !  Or  did  Miss  Wilde 
help  you  ?" 

Mrs.  Floyd  passed  back  the  Minneapolis  letter 

to  her  sister  and  bestowed  a  lady-like  frown 

on  the  new-comers.     She  disliked  to  be  called 

"  Frankie,"    but  what  is  to  be  done  between 

•    cousins  ? 

"  Jessie !"  she  expostulated  softly,  indicating 
Ogden  in  the  adjoining  room. 

"You  can't  think,"  the  girl  went  on,  to  Og 
den  redux,  "  how  proud  my  cousin  is  of  her  igno 
rance  of  Chicago.  She  knows  where  to  buy  her 
steaks,  and  she  has  mastered  the  shortest  way 
down  town,  and  that's  about  all.  Frankie,  dear, 
where  is  the  City  Hall  ?" 

"How  should  /  know?"  returned  Frances 
Floyd,  with  a  weary  disdain. 


23 


"  Why,  there's  the  corner  of  it,"  cried  Jessie 
Bradley,  at  the  window,  "not  two  blocks  off. 
It's  big  enough  to  see !" 

"And  she's  been  here  a  whole  year,  too!" 
cried  her  husband,  proudly  and  fondly. 

Mrs.  Floyd  drew  Jessie  Bradley  aside.  "I 
know  I'm  very  ignorant,"  she  said,  speaking  in 
a  low  tone,  "  but  there  is  one  thing  you  can  tell 
me  about,  if  you  want  to.  Why  have  you  been 
so  long  in  getting  up  to  the  office  ?  You  said 
May  me — May  me ;  I  suppose  that  means  Mary— 
you  said  that  she  was  going  to  stop  in  the  bank 
for  just  two  or  three  minutes." 

Jessie  looked  towards  her  young  friend,  who 
was  seated  near  Ogden  on  one  of  the  wide  win 
dow-sills.  Then  she  turned  back  to  her  ques 
tioner,  with  eyes  that  were  steady  and  perhaps 
a  bit  defiant. 

"  Well,  we  stopped  for  a  minute  in  that  insur 
ance  office  on  the  way  up.  We  came  part  way 
by  the  stairs.  Mayme  said  she  had  just  got  to 
see  him.  I  don't  see  how  she  can  meet  him 
anywhere  else.  They  won't  let  him  come  to  the 
house.  I  can't  see  that  her  brother  has  treated 
him  so  very  well." 

Mrs.  Floyd's  regard  travelled  from  the  culprit 
before  her  to  the  greater  culprit  on  the  window- 
sill.  Mary  Brainard  was  a  pretty  little  thing  of 
eighteen,  with  a  plump,  dimpled  face.  She  had 
wide  eyes  of  baby -blue  under  a  fluffy  flaxen 


24 


bang.  The  brim  of  her  hat  threw  a  shadow 
over  her  pink  cheeks,  and  she  was  nibbling  the 
finger-ends  of  her  gloves  between  her  firm  white 
teeth. 

Mrs.  Floyd  considered  this  picture  with  grave 
disapproval,  and  turned  back  to  her  young  cous 
in  a  face  full  of  severe  reproach. 

"Jessie,  I  don't  like  this.  It  wasn't  a  nice 
thing  for  you  to  do  at  all,  and  I'm  sure  your 
mother  would  agree  with  me.  Don't  mix  in  any 
such  matter.  Let  her  own  people  attend  to  it." 

Mary  Brainard  noticed  this  whispered  passage, 
and  suspected  herself  under  comment.  Her 
face,  rather  weakly  pretty  generally,  was  quite 
flushed  and  brilliant  now,  and  she  looked  out 
from  under  her  wide  hat  with  the  forced  audac 
ity  that  a  lightly  esteemed  nature  may  some 
times  assume,  and  afterwards,  to  everybody's 
surprise,  may  justify.  She  began  to  chat  bright 
ly  with  Ogden.  Her  gayety,  however,  was  evi 
dently  but  the  spending  momentum  of  some  re 
cent  impact,  and  the  bright  defiance  with  which 
she  glanced  around  the  group  was  not  more  a 
surprise  to  them  than  to  herself. 

Jessie  Bradley  crossed  over  to  the  window 
and  found  a  third  place  on  its  wide  sill.  Wai- 
worth  gathered  the  two  ladies  behind  the  shel 
ter  of  his  big  desk,  and  the  Minneapolis  matter 
was  resumed. 

"  No,"  said  Jessie,  as  she  settled  down,  "  Mrs. 


25 

D.  Walworth  Floyd  doesn't  know  where  the  City 
Hall  is."  She  was  in  a  slightly  nervous  state, 
and  she  caught  hold  of  the  first  piece  of  conver 
sational  driftwood  that  came  her  way.  "  I  ought 
to  have  asked  her  something  easier — where  La 
Salle  Street  was,  for  instance.  I  wonder  if  she 
knows  she's  on  it  now." 

"  Well,  Mr.  Ogden  is  going  to  have  a  chance 
to  learn  all  about  La  Salle  Street !"  cried  May  me 
Brainard,  with  the  air  of  one  who  dreads  the 
slightest  pause  in  the  talk.  "  He's  going  into 
the  Bank,  he  tells  me." 

"That  will  do  very  well  for  six  days  in  the 
week,"  declared  the  other.  "  How  about  the 
seventh  ?"  she  asked  with  a  twinkling  directness. 
"  Are  you  an  Episcopalian,  or  what  ?" 

"What,  I  fancy.  Why,  in  Rome,  I  suppose,.., 
I  shall  do  as  the  Romans  do.  For  the  forenoon 
there  are  the  newspapers,  of  course.  Then  for 
the  afternoon — the  races,  perhaps.  In  the  even 
ing — well,  the  theatre,  I  should  say.  That's 
about  the  plan  at  my  house." 

"  Well,  I've  never  been  to  the  theatre  Sunday 
evening,  nor  any  of  my  people.  And  I  don't 
believe  that  many  nice  people  do  go,  either. 
Perhaps  you  think  that  there  are  not  any  nice 
people  in  Chicago — I've  heard  the  remark  made. 
Well,  there  are,  I  can  tell  you — just  as  nice  as 
anywhere.  I  suppose  you've  noticed  the  way 
the  papers  here  have  of  collecting  all  the  mean, 


26 


hateful  things  that  the  whole  country  says  about 
us,  and  making  a  column  out  of  them.  I  dare 
say  they  think  it's  funny.  I  don't  know  but 
what  it  is.  There's  my  own  father,  now.  He 
reads  those  things  right  after  the  market -re 
ports,  and  time  and  time  again  I've  seen  him 
laugh  till  he  cried.  Yet  he  isn't  any  fonder  of 
a  joke  than  anybody  else.  He  says  it's  better 
to  be  abused  and  made  fun  of  than  not  to  be 
noticed  at  all.  How  does  it  strike  you  ?" 

She  made  a  little  moue,  as  she  recalled  one  or 
two  of  these  national  love-taps. 

"  And  I  must  say  it's  awful,  too — the  sort  of 
news  that  is  sent  out  from  here — excursions  and 
alarums,  and  nothing  else.  During  the  anarchist 
time  folks  down  East  were  a  good  deal  more 
scared  than  we  were.  And  I  remember,  when  I 
was  at  school,  I  read  in  the  Philadelphia  papers 
that  typhoid  fever  was  raging  in  Chicago.  They 
gave  the  death-rate  and  everything.  I  came 
home,  as  fast  as  I  could.  I  expected  to  find 
the  whole  family  dying.  But  they  didn't  know 
anything  about  it.  And  they  took  my  pocket- 
money  to  pay  the  return  fare.  They  were  alive 
enough." 

Ogden  smiled.  He  saw  that  he  was  face  to 
face  with  a  true  daughter  of  the  West ;  she  had 
never  seen  him  before,  and  she  might  never  see 
him.  again,  yet  she  was  talking  to  him  with  per 
fect  friendliness  and  confidence.  Equally,  he  was 


27 


sure,  was  she  a  true  daughter  of  Chicago ;  she 
had  the  one  infallible  local  trait  —  she  would 
rather  talk  to  a  stranger  about  her  own  town 
than  about  any  other  subject. 

"  I  think  we  shall  have  to  reform  you,"  she 
went  on  presently,  "  in  advance.  I  believe  the 
proper  place  for  you  next  Sunday  would  be  St. 
Asaph's.  But  it's  high,  you  understand.  Come 
over ;  my  cousin  has  room  in  her  pew.  There  is 
a  vested  choir,  and  when  you  have  heard  Yibert's 
singing- 
She  stopped,  as  if  to  appreciate  her  own  dar 
ing — like  a  child  lighting  a  match.  Mary  Brain- 
ard  gave  a  little  start  and  put  her  hand  on  her 
friend's  arm,  yet  at  the  same  time  she  blushed 
slightly — less,  perhaps,  in  panic  than  in  pride. 

" — you  will  learn  what  it  is  that  brings  Mayme 
Brainard  all  the  way  over  from  Union  Park 
twice  every  Sunday,"  were  the  words  with  which 
this  sentence  was  mentally  concluded.  "  It's  like 
an  angel,"  she  continued  aloud.  "A  certain  kind 
of  angel,"  she  added  to  herself.  "  Do  you  sing  ?" 
"  Yes,  a  little." 

"  Then  of  course  you  play.  But  that  doesn't 
count.  Do  you  write?  But  everybody  does 
that,  too.  I  do.  Or  did.  I  carried  off  a  prize 
once.  It  kept  me  in  flowers  for  a  week.  Well, 
what  is  it — dialect  or  psychological  ?" 

"Business  letters,"  answered  Ogden,  with  a 
balking  sobriety. 


28 


"  Pshaw !  "Well,  then,  can  you  sketch,  or  can 
you  do  anything  in  water-colors  ?  I  did  a  love 
ly  head  of  Desdemona  once  —  in  crayon.  That 
was  at  Ogontz." 

"  Kodak,"  Ogden  confessed  briefly.  "  Yiews 
along  the  wharves  in  Boston ;  some  pretty  bits 
from  around  Stockbridge." 

"  My  own  story  was  in  Stockbridge !  Our 
artist  on  the  spot !"  She  clapped  her  hands 
together  joyfully.  "  What  else  ?  Can  you — 
cook?" 

"No." 

"Neither  can  I!" 

"  Can  you  keep  books  ?"  he  asked  in  turn. 

"Not  a  bit." 

"Well,  I  can." 

"You  take  the  odd  trick.  Wait  a  minute, 
though.  How  about  private  theatricals  ?"  she 
asked. 

"  I  have  acted  in  them  once  or  twice." 

She  looked  aslant  at  Mary  Brainard.  The 
girl  seemed  glad  that  St.  Asaph's  had  been 
dropped,  but  she  was  hoping,  fearfully,  that  it 
might  be  taken  up  again. 

"  Well,  Father  Tisdale  has  everything  just 
about  perfect.  He's  from  St.  John  the  Evange 
list — Boston,  you  know.  And  you  ought  to  hear 
little  Mike  Besser.  He's  our  butcher's  boy — only 
eleven.  Sometimes  he  and  Russell  Yibert " — the 
other  girl  vibrated  at  this  first  audacious  men- 


29 


tion  of  the  full  name — "  sing  duets  together,  and 
then—" 

Her  eyes  rolled  around  the  room  in  a  mock 
ecstasy  and  rested  on  the  group  of  elders,  whose 
three  heads  just  showed  above  the  top  of  the 
desk.  Walworth's  face  made  quite  a  picture  of 
discomfort  and  distress,  as  he  rose  from  his  chair 
with  the  effect  of  trying  to  shake  himself  loose 
from  the  complications  that  his  wife  and  Sister 
Ann  were  weaving  about  him. 

"  The  whole  building  is  full  of  them,"  he  said, 
rather  pettishly;  "there  are  half  a  dozen  on 
every  floor.  But  /  don't  know  anything  about 
any  of  them." 

He  looked  inquiringly  towards  the  window 
seat. 

"  Ogden  might." 

"  How  is  that  ?"  inquired  the  young  fellow, 
rising. 

"  Some  real-estate  man.  Mrs.  Floyd's,  sister 
here  has  about  concluded  to  cast  in  her  lot  with 
us.  She  wants  an  adviser.  Perhaps  you  happen 
to  know  of— 

He  took  on  the  ingenuous  air  of  one  who  is 
earnestly  searching  for  information — in  the  least 
likely  quarter. 

Ogden  laughed  self-consciously. 

"Well,  now,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  I  do.  His 
name  is  McDowell.  He  is  on  the  second  floor 
above.  I  have  a  sort  of  personal  interest  in  him. 


30 


He  will  be  my  brother-in-law  within  a  month  or 
six  weeks." 

A.  slight  flutter  among  the  women — the  men 
tion  of  matrimony. 

"  Do  you  want  to  try  that,  Ann?"  asked  Floyd. 

"  We  became  acquainted  with  him  down  East, 
last  year,"  Ogden  went  on,  proud  to  show  his 
newness  wearing  off.  "  He  was  working  up  a 
syndicate.  He  calls  himself  a  hustler.  He  tells 
me  he  has  just  opened  a  new  subdivision  out 
south  somewhere — beyond  "Washington  Park,  I 
believe.  I  think  you'll  find  him  posted." 

Older  people  than  Ogden  frequently  go  out  of 
their  way  to  run  cheerfully  the  risk  of  advising 
others  in  business  matters. 

"  I  believe  I'll  see  him,  anyway,"  decided  Miss 
Wilde.  Like  all  women,  she  embraced  the  per 
sonal  element  in  every  affair.  The  people  in 
Minneapolis  became  mere  myths,  now  that  she 
found  herself  so  near  to  the  future  husband  of 
the  sister  of  the  man  who  had  just  presented  a 
letter  of  introduction  to  her  own  brother-in-law. 
The  chain  was  long,  to  be  sure,  and  some  of  its 
links  were  rather  weak — but  it  served. 

Mrs.  Floyd  arose,  shaking  out  the  folds  of  her 
dress  and  smoothing  away  the  wrinkles  that 
the  last  half-hour  had  accumulated  on  her  fore 
head. 

"  I  have  asked  Mr.  Ogden  to  go  to  church  with 
us  Sunday,"  Jessie  Bradley  announced  to  her. 


31 


"And  he  is  going  to  bring  some  Stockbriclge 
photographs." 

"  First-rate !"  cried  Wai  worth,  relieved  by  any 
outcome  whatever.  "  Stockbridge !  Why,  that's 
where  I  did  my  courting !" 

Mrs.  Floyd  was  caught  in  a  melting  mood. 

"  We  shall  be  very  happy  to  see  Mr.  Ogden," 
she  pronounced  primly. 


Ill 

IN  one  of  the  first-floor  corners  of  the  Clifton 
is  situated  the  Underground  National  Bank — 
Erastus  M.  Brainard,  president. 

The  Underground  is  not  so  styled  on  account 
of  the  policy  and  methods  of  its  head,  oblique 
and  subterranean  though  they  may  be;  it  is 
merely  that  the  Clifton  is  almost  entirely  shut 
in  by  its  tall  neighbors,  and  that,  so  far  as  its 
lower  floors  are  concerned,  direct  sunlight,  ex 
cept  for  a  month  or  two  in  the  early  summer,  is 
pretty  nearly  out  of  the  question.  We  shall 
have  to  throw  our  own  sunlight  on  the  Under 
ground  and  on  the  man  who  is  its  president  and 
its  principal  stockholder. 

The  Underground  is  not  one  of  the  old  banks, 
nor  is  it  one  of  the  large  ones ;  if  Brainard  had 
no  other  irons  in  the  fire  he  would  not  cut  much 
of  a  figure  in  business  circles.  The  Underground 
is  simply  one  in  a  batch  of  banks  that  have 
sprung  up  in  the  last  seven  or  eight  years  and 
that  are  almost  unknown,  even  by  name,  to  men 
who,  in  the  clearing-house  at  that  time,  have 
since  passed  on  to  other  and  different  affairs.  It 
is  spoken  of  as  Brainard's  bank,  just  as  other 


33 


banks  are  spoken  of  as  Shayne's,  or  Cutter's,  or 
Patterson's.  Now  Shayne,  for  example,  began 
life  with  a  fruit-stand — Jim  Shayne  they  called 
him.  The  fruit-stand  developed  into  a  retail 
grocery,  and  Jim  Shayne  (about  the  time  of  the 
Fire)  became  J.  H.  Shayne.  The  retail  grocery 
expanded  into  a  wholesale  grocery,  and  the  sign 
read,  "  James  H.  Shayne  &  Co.,"  and  the  firm 
made  money.  But  the  day  dawned  when  his 
wife  began  to  figure  at  dances  and  receptions — 
her  own  and  those  of  other  people — as  Mrs. 
James  Horton  Shayne,  and  when  his  daughter's 
wedding  was  not  far  away,  with  all  the  splendor 
that  St.  Asaph's  could  command.  This  was  no 
juncture  for  laying  undue  stress  on  the  whole 
sale  grocery  business ;  it  seemed  worth  while  to 
become  identified  a  little  less  closely  with  mer 
cantile  circles  and  a  little  more  closely  with 
financial  circles.  Shayne  &  Co.  went  right  on — 
both  routine  and  profits ;  but  the  High-flyers' 
National  was  started,  and  James  Horton  Shayne 
was  more  likely  to  be  found  on  La  Salle  Street 
than  on  Kiver  Street. 

Cutter  was  in  hardware.  His  daughter  was 
a  great  beauty.  One  day  he  dropped  hardware 
in  favor  of  his  sons,  to  become  the  head  of  a 
board  of  directors.  Then  people  could  say, 
"Ah!  a  fine  girl  that!  Her  father  runs  the 
Parental  National." 

Patterson's  case  was  different.  He  had  just 
3 


34 


invested  half  a  million  in  a  big  business  block, 
and  his  daughter  had  just  invested  her  all  in  a 
husband.  The  best  office  in  the  new  building 
remained  tenantless  at  the  end  of  six  months, 
and  the  man  of  his  daughter's  choice  continued 
practically  without  occupation  during  the  same 
term.  The  office  was  worth  ten  thousand  dol 
lars,  the  son-in-law — in  the  present  state  of  things 
— about  ten  thousand  cents.  So  Patterson,  in 
order  to  secure  a  tenant  for  his  new  building  and 
a  career  for  his  new  son,  started  a  new  financial 
institution — the  Exigency  Trust  Co. 

But  no  such  considerations  as  these  influenced 
Erastus  Brainard  when  he  founded  the  Under 
ground.  He  was  far  aside  from  all  social  ambi 
tions,  and  his  domestic  affairs  took  care  of  them 
selves.  His  business  interests  spread  all  over  the 
city,  the  state,  the  West,  even  the  Far  West, 
and  this  vast  web  must  have  a  centre.  That 
centre  was  on  the  lower  floor  of  the  Clifton, 
where  he  ran  a  bank,  true,  but  a  good  many 
other  things  besides. 

Brainard  had  come  up  from  the  southern  part 
of  the  state — from  "  Egypt,"  as  it  is  called.  A 
darkness  truly  Egyptian  brooded  over  his  early 
history,  so  that  if  it  is  a  fact  that  he  was  an  ex- 
horter  at  Methodist  camp-meetings  in  his  early 
twenties,  proof  of  that  fact  might  be  sought  for 
in  vain.  The  first  definite  point  in  his  career  is 
this ;  that  as  a  youngish  man  he  was  connected 


35 


in  some  capacity  with  a  cross-country  railroad 
on  the  far  side  of  Centralia.  How  successful  he 
was  in  transporting  souls  no  one  can  say ;  that 
he  has  been  successful  in  transporting  bodies  no 
one  will  deny.  He  is  unrivalled  in  his  mastery 
of  the  street-car  question,  and  his  operations  have 
lain  in  many  scattered  fields. 

To  claim  that  Brainard  has  a  national  reputa 
tion  would  be  going  too  far.  However,  his  rep 
utation  might  fairly  be  termed  inter-state.  If 
the  man  were  to  die  to-morrow,  sketches  of  his 
life  would  appear  in  the  papers  of  Milwaukee, 
Indianapolis,  and  St.  Louis ;  and  the  caustic  and 
frankly  abusive  paragraphs  would  be  copied  ap 
preciatively  as  far  as  the  remoter  counties  of 
Nebraska.  For  Brainard's  success  is  not  with 
out  the  elements  of  public  scandal.  His  manipu 
lation  of  city  councils  and  of  state  legislatures 
has  been  freely  charged.  Old  stories  of  his  brief 
incarceration  in  prison,  or  of  his  narrow  escape 
from  it,  sometimes  arise  and  flutter ;  and  there 
are  those  who  think  that  if  he  never  has  been  in 
jail,  then  this  is  all  the  more  reason  for  his  being 
there  now.  His  demise  would  indeed  set  the 
clipping-bureaus  to  work ;  but  the  work  would 
not  be  started  by  the  direction  of  his  surviving 
family.  Such  is  the  chief  to  whom  young  George 
Ogden  has  sworn  allegiance. 

"  I  shall  marry  him,"  said  a  voice  quite  firmly ; 
"  you  may  make  up  your  mind  to  that." 


36 


Ogden  started.  These  words  came  through  a 
door  which  stood  ajar  in  the  partition  that  sep 
arated  him  from  the  president's  room ;  the  office 
was  splendid  with  bevelled  glass  and  oxidized 
iron-work,  yet  it  was  as  compact  as  high  rentals 
compel.  They  were  words  in  striking  contrast 
to  most  of  the  talk  that  his  pen  commanded. 
"  Make  it  thirty  days  more  "  ;  "  I'll  take  the  rest 
in  small  bills,  please  "  ;  "  It  will  be  due  day  after 
to-morrow."  And  with  these — "  I  shall  marry 
him  ;  make  up  your  mind  to  that." 

He  knew  the  voice  perfectly  well;  he  had 
heard  it  a  fortnight  before  in  Floyd's  office. 

The  door  in  the  partition  opened  a  foot  or  two 
wider ;  the  bulky  figure  of  Erastus  Brainard  ap 
peared  and  his  hard  and  determined  face.  He 
was  a  tall,  broad-shouldered  man  with  a  close- 
clipped  gray  beard  and  a  shaven  upper  lip.  Two 
or  three  red  veins  showed  prominently  in  his 
bulbous  nose.  He  wore  black  broadcloth ;  his 
coat  had  a  velvet  Collar,  and  on  his  shoulders 
there  was  a  light  iall  of  dandruff.  He  wore 
boots.  On  Sundays  his  boots  had  "tongues," 
and  his  trade  was  the  mainstay  of  a  German 
shoemaker  who  kept  a  shop  behind  his  house, 
and  whom,  twice  a  year,  he  literally  terrified 
into  a  fit. 

But  now  his  big  figure  clutched  at  the  red- 
cherry  door-jamb  with  a  tremulous  hesitancy, 
the  hard,  fierce  eyes  looked  out  appealingly  from 


37 


under  their  coarse  and  shaggy  brows,  and  the 
proud  and  cruel  lips  opened  themselves  to  ad 
dress  the  young  man  with  an  order  that  was 
almost  an  entreaty. 

"  Ogden,  won't  you  ask  Mr.  Fairchild  to  step 
this  way  ?" 

For  a  mouse  had  come  into  the  place,  and  the 
elephant  was  in  terror. 

The  Underground  National  Bank,  with  a  sur 
plus  equal  to  a  third  of  its  capital,  had  not  de 
clared  a  dividend  for  several  years.  Brainard, 
along  with  his  son  and  his  brother,  owned  five 
eighths  of  the  stock.  Put  these  two  facts  to 
gether  and  surmise  the  rest.  Understand,  with 
out  the  telling,  how  Brainard  had  bought  back 
big  blocks  of  stock  from  men  who  had  invested 
on  his  own  advice  and  representations,  only  to 
sell  out  at  less  than  two  thirds  the  price  they 
had  paid.  Understand  how  widowed  and  un 
protected  women,  with  little  realization  of  the 
remote  possibilities  of  the  science  of  banking  and 
no  realization  at  all  of  the  way  in  which  their 
five  thousands  had  come  to  be  worth  so  much 
less  than  five  thousand,  would  come  to  his  office 
to  implore  ingenuously  with  sobs  and  tears  that 
he  would  give  them  back  their  money.  Con 
sider  these  and  a  dozen  other  phases  of  the  pleas 
ant  pastime  known  as  "freeze  out,"  and  then 
judge  whether  Brainard,  by  this  time,  were  capa 
ble  or  no  of  braving,  warding  off,  beating  down, 


38 


despising  the  threats,  the  imprecations,  the  plead- 
,  the  attacks  of  the  harmless  domestic  an 
imal  known  as  the  investor.  But  now  another 
Domestic  animal,  the  wilful  daughter,  had  en 
tered  his  lair,  and  with  this  new  antagonist  he 
felt  himself  unable  to  cope. 

"  Ogden,  won't  you  ask  Mr.  Fairchild  to  step 
this  way  ?" 

Fairchild  was  only  the  cashier  of  the  bank, 
while  Brainard  was  its  head  ;  but  Fairchild  was 
a  good  deal  of  a  man  —  and  that  was  more  than 
Brainard,  with  all  his  money  and  his  brains  and 
his  consciencelessness,  and  all  the  added  power 
/bf  the  three  combined,  could  have  claimed  for 
himself.  He  was  merely  a  financial  appliance  — 
one  of  the  tools  of  the  trade. 

He  had  no  friends  —  none  even  of  the  poor 
sort  known  as  "business"  friends.  He  had  no 
social  relations  of  any  kind.  He  had  no  sense  of 
any  right  relation  to  the  community  in  which  he 
lived.  He  had  next  to  no  family  life.  He  had 
no  apparent  consciousness  of  the  physical  basis 
of  existence  —  for  him  diet,  rest,  hygiene  were 
mere  nothings.  But  none  of  these  considerations 
disturbed  him  very  much.  He  could  do  without 
friends  —  having  so  good  a  friend  in  himself.  He 
could  dispense  with  social  diversion  —  so  long  as 
the  affairs  of  the  Underground,  and  the  Illumi 
nating  Company,  and  those  Western  mines  con 
tinued  to  occupy  his  attention.  He  could  rub 


39 


along  without  the  sympathy  and  respect  of  the 
community — while  he  and  it  held  the  relative 
positions  of  knife  and  oyster.  He  could  do  per 
fectly  well  without  hygiene  and  proper  regimen 
as  long  as  dyspepsia  and  nerves  and  rheumatism 
were  not  too  pressing  in  their  attentions.  And 
he  could,  of  course,  trust  his  family  to  run  itself 
without  any  great  amount  of  attention  from  its 
natural  head. 

His  family  had  run  itself  for  twenty  odd 
years.  It  had  gone  on  its  scattered  way  re 
joicing —  after  the  good,  new,  Western  fashion 
which  finds  the  unit  of  society  less  in  the  family^ 
than  in  the  individual ;  and  now  a  very  prom 
ising  young  filly,  after  having  "  run  "  herself  for 
a  good  part  of  this  twenty  years,  was  on  the 
point  of  taking  the  bit  between  her  teeth  and 
of  running  away  altogether.  The  family  carry 
all,  whose  front  seat  he  had  left  in  order  that 
he  might  irresponsibly  dangle  his  legs  out  from 
behind,  was  in  danger  of  a  runaway  and  a  smash- 
up,  and  he  was  forced  to  the  humiliating  ex 
pedient  of  installing  a  more  competent  driver 
than  himself  in  his  own  place  behind  the  dash 
board. 

Ogden  slid  rapidly  along  the  narrow  aisle 
which  ran  behind  the  row  of  coops  that  con 
fined  the  tellers,  and  found  Fairchild  going  over 
yesterday's  balances  with  the  general  book 
keeper.  Here  he  was  intercepted  by  the  last 


40 


of  the  messengers,  who  had  had  some  delay  in 
getting  his  batch  of  drafts  and  notes  arranged 
properly  into  a  route. 

He  was  a  boy  of  seventeen,  with  a  pert  nose 
and  a  pasty  complexion.  He  had  put  on  his  hat 
with  a  backward  tilt  that  displayed  his  bang. 
He  was  the  son  of  a  millionnaire  stockholder,  and 
was  on  the  threshold  of  his  business  career.  He 
panted  for  consideration,  and  he  had  found,  dur 
ing  an  experience  of  six  months,  that  most  con 
sideration  was  to  be  won  from  the  newest  men. 

"  What's  up  now,  George  ?"  he  asked,  famil 
iarly.  He  twitched  his  narrow  little  shoulders 
as  he  teetered  back  and  forth  on  his  toes.  "  Old 
man  on  the  rampage  some  more?  He's  had  it 
pretty  bad  for  the  last  three  weeks." 

"  Oh,  get  out !"  Ogden  responded  briefly. 

Fairchild  was  a  man  well  on  in  the  fifties. 
He  had  a  quiet,  self-contained  manner,  a  smooth 
forehead,  a  gray  moustache.  His  general  trust 
worthiness  was  highly  esteemed  by  Brainard, 
who  generally  treated  him  with  civility  and 
sometimes  almost  ,with  consideration.  He  had 
his  privileges.  A  member  of  the  board  of 
directors  in  the  Brainard  interest,  he  would  be 
given  the  opportunity  to  resign  whenever  some 
especially  dubious  piece  of  business  was  looming 
up,  with  the  certainty  of  re-election  within  the 
year.  He  was  too  old  to  tear  himself  up  by  the 
roots,  and  too  valuable  to  be  allowed,  in  any 


41 


event,  the  radical  boon  of  transplantation.  Of 
course  he  paid  for  such  a  concession ;  he  acted 
as  a  buffer  between  Brainard  and  the  more 
pathetic  of  the  stockholders,  and  now,  as  we 
see,  he  was  summoned  to  deal  with  a  domestic 
crisis. 

"  My  dear  girl,"  Ogden  presently  heard  him 
saying  in  a  dry,  cautious,  and  yet  somewhat 
parental  tone,  "  you  know  what  his  position  is. 
Not  in  the  church  ;  no,  I  don't  mean  that.  He 
is  only  a  policy  clerk  in  that  insurance  office,  at 
ten  dollars  a  week,  probably  —  hardly  enough 
for  him  to  live  on  decently,  alone.  Yes,  I  know 
he  gets  more  from  the  choir,  but  even  that — " 

Ogden  stopped  one  ear  by  propping  his  elbow 
on  his  ledger  and  putting  his  hand  to  his  head, 
and  went  on  with  his  writing  as  well  as  he  could. 
But  he  had  left  the  Underground  for  St.  Asaph's; 
he  was  busy  no  longer  with  notes  for  collection, 
but  with  the  notes  —  the  melting  tenor  notes  — 
of  the  all-admired  Vibert.  His  fellow  -  clerks 
noiselessly  retired,  and  a  long  train  of  choristers 
slowly  made  their  way  through  the  long  aisle 
the  others  had  left  vacant.  Among  them  Yibert 
—tall,  dark,  hard,  and  cruel ;  an  angel,  possibly  ; 
but  if  so,  surely  one  of  the  fallen.  And  a  little 
girl  of  eighteen,  whose  blue  eyes  showed  out 
from  under  her  fluffy  blond  locks,  and  whose 
lips  Avere  parted  in  a  radiant,  reverent  smile, 
steadied  a  trembling  hand  on  the  back  of  a  pew 


and  looked  after  him  with  a  fond,  open,  and 
intense  regard  that  was  a  perfect  epitome  of 
love. 

Those  same  blue  eyes  were  now  on  the  other 
side  of  the  partition,  regarding  her  father's 
lieutenant  with  a  look  as  bright  and  hard  as 
was  ever  her  father's  own ;  and  as  she  listened 
to  the  words  of  warning,  those  same  full  and 
pliant  lips  set  themselves  in  a  firm  line  that 
Brainard  himself  could  not  have  made  straighter 
or  more  unswerving. 

"  Nobody  really  knows,"  the  cashier  went  on, 
"  who  his  people  are,  or  where  he  is  from,  or 
anything  definite  about  him.  He  is  one  of  thou 
sands.  Here  is  a  town  full  to  overflowing  with 
single  young  men.  They  come  from  everywhere, 
for  all  reasons.  They  are  taken  on  faith,  largely, 
and  are  treated  pretty  well.  Most  of  them  are 
all  right,  no  doubt ;  but  others —  Of  course  I 
know  nothing  about  Mr. — about  this  one;  but 
your  own  brother,  now — " 

"  That's  just  what  I  tell  her,"  broke  in  Brain 
ard,  with  a  distressful  whimper.  "  Burt  says,  and 
he  knows  it's  true,  that — 

Ogden  again  stopped  his  ears.  If  by  any  pos 
sibility  there  was  aught  good  under  that  chaste 
surplice,  he  would  not  wilfully  deprive  himself 
of  any  chance  for  belief.  If  that  full  neck  and 
heavy  jaw  and  sinister  eye  and  world -worn 
cheek  and  elaborate  assumption  of  professional 


43 


sanctity  offered  the  slightest  prospect  of  decent 
manliness  and  of  happy  home  life,  he  would  not 
allow  one  mere  solitary  phrase  to  shut  that  pros 
pect  out.  But  he  could  not  shut  out  a  disgust 
that  gradually  crept  in  upon  him — a  disgust  for 
the  man  who  would  arrange  the  most  sacredjand 
confidential  affairs  of  his  family  circle  inVthe 
same  general  fashion  that  he  would  use  for  deal 
ing  with  the  concerns  of  an  ordinary  business 
acquaintance ;  a  disgust  for  the  family  life  in 
which  such  a  state  of  things  was  possible.  Had 
the  girl  no  mother  ?  She  had,  indeed ;  but  that 
mother  was  an  invalid — one  who,  with  the  ad 
vancing  years,  had  come  to  know  more  and  more 
of  tonics  and  cordials,  and  less  and  less  of  her 
daughters'  needs.  Had  she  no  brother?  But 
what  can  a  brother  do  ?  —  order  the  intruder 
from  the  premises  and  intimidate  him  from  re 
turning,  which  Burt  had  done.  Were  there  no 
friends  or  relations  to  see  how  matters  were  going 
and  to  speak  out  their  minds  boldly  ?  But  when 
ever  has  such  a  course  availed?  The  friends 
cease  to  be  friends,  and  the  relatives  are  relatives 
at  a  greater  remove  only,  and  all  goes  on  as  be 
fore.  No ;  there  was  only  one  way  to  settle  this 
affair — the  "business"  way;  and  that  way  Brain- 
ard  took — necessarily,  instinctively. 

He  had  never  lived  for  anything  but  business. 
He  had  never  eaten  and  drunk  for  anything  but 
business  —  his  family  shared  his  farm -like  fare 


44 


)  and  his  primitive  hours.  He  had  never  built  for 
anything  but  business ;  though  constantly  in 
vesting  in  grounds  and  buildings,  he  had  occu 
pied  his  own  home  for  fifteen  years  as  a  tenant 
merely,  before  he  could  bring  himself  to  a  grudg 
ing  purchase.  He  never  dressed  for  anything 
but  business  —  he  had  never  worn  a  dress-coat 
in  his  life.  He  wrote  about  nothing  but  business 
— his  nearest  relative  was  never  more  than  "dear 
sir,"  and  he  himself  was  never  otherwise  than 
"  yours  truly  "  ;  and  he  wrote  on  business  letter- 

x heads  even  to  his  family.  And  now  that  the 
present  domestic  difficulty  was  to  be  adjusted,  no 
other  method  was  available.  But  he  had  the  sat 
isfaction  of  feeling  that  his  daughter  was  meet 
ing  him  in  his  own  spirit  and  on  his  own  ground. 
She  eyed  him  with  a  cold  and  direct  gaze  like 
that  of  the  sun  which  is  setting  in  a  clear  winter 
sky.  Not  a  single  cloud-shred  of  affection  showed 
itself  in  the  wide  expanse  of  crisp  and  tingling 
atmosphere  which  she  seemed  to  have  created 
about  her;  not  a  particle  of  floating  vapor 
helped  to  diffuse  a  glow  of  sentiment  over  a  situ 
ation  which  had  much  need  of  some  such  soften 
ing  influence.  Her  fierce  little  glance  tore  down 
every  scrap  of  reverence,  of  home  love,  of  filial 
duty :  life  had  never  seemed  to  him  quite  so 
bald,  so  unfurnished,  so  bereft  of  unbusi ness-like 
non-essentials. 

"  I  shall  marry  Eussell,"  she  declared,  "in  spite 


45 


of  you  and  in  spite  of  everything.  You  may 
say  that  he  has  no  money,  and  that  you  don't 
know  his  family ;  and  Burt  may  forbid  him  the 
house  and  go  prying  into  his  private  affairs ;  and 
you  may  say  that  he  has  no  friends  and  no  abili 
ties,  and  as  much  more  as  you  please.  I  don't 
care ;  I  shall  be  his  wife.  I  won't  believe  any  of 
these  things,  and  nobody  shall  separate  us." 

She  rose,  flushed  and  frowning,  and  walked 
out  firmly.  Fairchild  opened  the  opposite  door 
and  moved  off  quietly  to  his  own  place.  Brain- 
ard  brushed  aside  a  pile  of  abstracts  and  mort 
gages  that  encumbered  his  desk,  found  an  open 
ing  big  enough  for  his  elbow,  and  leaned  over 
his  blotting-pad  with  an  air  of  utter  dejection 
and  defeat. 


IY 

ON  the  twelfth  floor  of  the  Clifton— at  the 
far  end  of  a  long  corridor — is  the  office  of  Eu 
gene  H.  McDowell,  real  estate. 

Ogden,  at  the  beginning  of  one  of  his  brief 
noonings,  took  the  elevator  up  to  the  quarters 
of  his  coming  brother-in-law. 

He  found  McDowell  stretching  himself  vio 
lently  in  his  swivel  chair,  which  was  tilted  as  far 
back  as  its  mechanism  would  permit;  his  head 
was  thrown  back,  too,  as  far  as  anatomical  con 
siderations  would  allow.  His  eyes  would  have 
seen  the  ceiling  if  they  had  not  been  so  tight 
shut;  his  Adam's  apple  appeared  prominently 
between  the  turned-down  points  of  his  collar. 
His  desk  was  strewn  with  a  litter  of  papers,  and 
the  tassels  depending  from  his  map-rack  began 
a  trembling  at  varying  heights  as  Ogden  closed 
the  door  behind  him. 

"  Waugh — oo !"  yawned  McDowell,  with  his 
mouth  at  its  widest.  Then  he  let  his  chair  down, 
all  at  once.  "  Oh,  it's  you,  George,  is  it  ?" 

He  used  the  careless  and  patronizing  freedom 
of  a  man  of  thirty  odd  to  another  several  years 
his  junior — of  a  man  in  business  for  himself  to  a 


47 


man  in  business  for  some  one  else — of  a  man 
who  was  presently  to  undertake  the  protection 
and  support  of  the  other's  sister. 

"  Sit  down."  He  motioned  Ogden  to  a  chair 
which  stood  close  to  the  window — a  window  that 
looked  out  on  the  court  and  that  commanded  the 
multifarious  panorama  of  daily  business  going 
on  behind  the  ranks  and  rows  of  great  glass 
sheets  which  formed  the  other  three  sides  of  the 
enclosure — the  ends  of  over-crowded  desks,  the 
digital  dumb-show  of  stenographers,  the  careful 
handling  by  shirt-sleeved  clerks  of  the  damp  yel 
low  sheets  in  copying-books,  the  shaking  fingers 
and  nodding  heads  that  accompanied  the  per 
suasion  and  expostulation  of  personal  interviews. 

McDowell  presented  a  physiognomy  that 
seemed  to  have  been  stripped  of  all  superfluities. 
He  contrived  to  avoid  the  effect  of  absolute  lean 
ness,  yet  he  was  without  a  spare  ounce  of  flesh. 
His  cheek-bones  did  not  obtrude  themselves,  nor 
were  his  finger-joints  unduly  prominent ;  yet  his 
trousers  seemed  more  satisfactory  as  trousers 
than  his  legs  as  legs,  and  his  feet  were  in  long, 
narrow,  thin-soled  shoes,  through  whose  flexible 
leather  one  almost  divined  the  articulations  of 
his  toes.  His  hair  had  shrunk  back  from  his 
forehead  and  temples,  but  his  moustache  sprang 
out  as  boldly  and  decidedly  as  if  constructed  of 
steel  wires.  His  nose  was  sharp ;  his  eyes  were 
like  two  gimlets.  The  effect  of  his  presence  was 


48 


nervous,  excitant,  dry  to  aridity.  He  had  a  flat- 
tish  chest  and  bony  shoulders ;  his  was  an  earth 
ly  tabernacle  that  gave  its  tailor  considerable 
cause  for  study. 

"  Your  friends  called  again  this  morning,"  he 
began,  folding  up  two  or  three  documents  and 
thrusting  them  into  the  pigeon-holes  before  him. 
"  We  have  had  quite  a  session.  But  they're  fixed 
finally.  Does  that  cousin  of  theirs  live  with 
them  ?" 

"  Cousin  ?  Isn't  she  their  sister  —  sister-in- 
law  ?" 

"  I  mean  the  other  one ;  Miss— Bradley,  isn't 
it?" 

"  Oh  !  "Well,  no ;  she  comes  in  and  stays  with 
them  a  week  now  and  then.  But  her  people 
live  in  Hinsdale." 

"  Hinsdale ;  nice  country  around  there.  Seems 
as  if  you  just  had  to  get  outside  of  Cook  County 
to  find  anything  hilly  or  even  rolling.  I'd  like 
to  take  it  up  first  rate.  The  minute  you  are 
over  the  county  line  you  get  clean  out  of  all 
that  flat  land  and  everything's  up  and  down — 
like  around  Worcester.  But  I  don't  believe  they 
save  much  on  taxes." 

He  tore  some  pencilled  memoranda  off  the  top 
of  a  pad  and  threw  them  into  the  waste-basket. 

"Yes,  the  sister-in-law  was  here,  all  right 
enough.  She's  a  pretty  smart  woman,  too  ;  got 
a  good  deal  more  head  than  any  of  the  rest  of 


49 


them.  She's  striking  out  a  little  late,  but  she 
may  make  something  of  herself,  yet. 

"  But  she  wants  to  get  that  poetical  streak 
out  of  her,"  he  went  on.  "  What  was  it  she 
said,  now  ?  Oh,  yes  ;  all  this  down-town  racket 
came  to  her  like  the  music  of  a  battle-hymn. 
Our  hustling,  it  seems,  resembles  a  hand-to-hand 
combat  from  street  to  street — she  lugged  in  med 
iaeval  Florence.  And  to  finish  up  with,  she  told 
me  I  was  like  a  gladiator  stripped  for  the  fray." 
He  ran  his  hand  down  the  stripes  of  his  hand 
some  trousers.  "  What  did  she  mean  by  that  ? 
Was  it  some  of  her  Boston  literary  business  ?" 

He  lifted  his  hand  and  thoughtfully  twirled 
the  scanty  locks  over  one  of  his  ears. 

"  Here's  a  letter  I  got  this  morning  from  Kit- 
tie."  He  drew  out  a  small  folded  sheet  from  the 
bottom  of  a  pile  of  correspondence.  "  She  has 
about  come  around  to  my  way  of  thinking. 
There  don't  seem  any  very  good  reason  for  my 
travelling  away  down  there  again,  especially 
when  your  father  and  mother  are  going  to  move 
out  here  anyway.  I'm  awful  busy.  She'll  have 
her  own  family  at  the  wedding,  then,  and  she'll 
give  me  a  show  to  scare  up  some  of  mine. 
Things  are  just  too  rushing — that's  the  amount 
of  it." 

"  I'm  glad  to  have  it  settled  one  way  or  an 
other,"  George  said.  "  And  how  about  that  oth 
er  affair — have  you  made  any  report  to  father  2" 
4 


50 


"  Yes.  That's  as  good  as  settled.  The  deeds 
are  all  made  out  ;  they've  only  got  to  be  signed." 
He  reached  into  one  of  his  pigeon-holes  and 
brought  out  a  bulk  of  bluish  paper  whose  frac 
tious  folds  were  held  in  some  shape  by  a  wide 
rubber  strap.  "Here's  one  of  the  abstracts- 
just  come  in.  The  other  is  a  good  deal  longer 
and  the  copy  isn't  finished.  I  suppose  they'll 
put  that  one  on  a  board." 

He  snapped  the  band  once  or  twice  and  put 
the  abstract  back  again. 

"I'm  glad,"  he  said,  "that  your  father  has 
finally  decided  to  pull  up  altogether  and  to 
transfer  everything  to  the  West.  That  old 
block  of  his  was  wanting  repairs  all  the  time  ;  I 
don't  believe  it  paid  him  four  per  cent.  It  takes 
more  than  soldiers'  monuments  and  musical  fes 
tivals  to  make  a  town  move." 

George  felt  his  heart  give  an  indignant  throb. 
He  seemed  to  see  before  him  the  spokesman 
of  a  community  where  prosperity  had  drugged 
patriotism  into  unconsciousness,  and  where  the 
bare  scaffoldings  of  materialism  felt  themselves 
quite  independent  of  the  graces  and  draperies 
of  culture.  It  seemed  hardly  possible  that  one 
short  month  could  make  his  native  New  Eng 
land  appear  so  small,  so  provincial,  so  left- 
behind. 

"  You've  got  to  have  snap,  go.  You've  got 
to  have  a  big  new  country  behind  you.  How 


51 


much  do  you  suppose  people  in  Iowa  and  Kan 
sas  and  Minnesota  think  about  Down  East  ?  Not 
a  great  deal.  -  It's  Chicago  they're  looking  to. 
This  town  looms  up  before  them  and  shuts  out 
Boston  and  New  York  and  the  whole  seaboard 
from  the  sight  and  the  thoughts  of  the  West 
and  the  Northwest  and  the  New  Northwest  and 
the  Far  West  and  all  the  other  Wests  yet  to  be 
invented.  They  read  our  papers,  they  come  here 
to  buy  and  to  enjoy  themselves."  He  turned 
his  thumb  towards  the  ceiling,  and  gave  it  an 
upward  thrust  that  sent  it  through  the  six  ceil 
ings  above  it.  "  If  you'd  go  up  on  our  roof  and 
hear  them  talking — 

"  Oh,  well,"  said  George;  "hadn't  we  better 
get  something  to  eat?" 

"  And  Avhat  kind  of  a  town  is  it  that's  want 
ed,"  pursued  McDowell,  as  he  pulled  down  the 
cover  of  his  desk,  "  to  take  up  a  big  national  en 
terprise  and  put  it  through  with  a  rush  ?  A  big 
town,  of  course,  but  one  that  has  grown  big  so 
fast  that  it  hasn't  had  time  to  grow  old.  One 
with  lots  of  youth  and  plenty  of  momentum. 
Young  enough  to  be  confident  and  enthusiastic, 
and  to  have  no  cliques  and  sets  full  of  bickerings 
and  jealousies.  A  town  that  will  all  pull  one 
way.  What's  New  York  ?"  he  asked,  flourishing 
his  towel  from  the  corner  where  the  wash-stand 
stood.  "  It  ain't  a  city  at  all ;  it's  like  London 
— it's  a  province.  Father  Knickerbocker  is  too 


52 


old,  and  too  big  and  logy,  and  too  all-fired  self 
ish.  We  are  the  people,  right  here.  Well, 
Johnny,  you  hold  the  fort,"  he  called  to  a  boy 
who  was  dividing  an  open-eyed  attention  be 
tween  this  oration  and  his  own  sandwich;  "I've 
got  to  have  a  bite  myself." 

"  How  are  you  getting  on  downstairs  ?"  he 
asked,  as  they  tramped  over  the  tiles  of  the  long 
corridor  towards  the  elevators.  "  I  hear  you 
were  over  at  Brainard's  house  last  night — he's  a 
fine  bird.  And  his  son  is  like  him.  He's  got 
another,  hasn't  he— a  younger  one  ?  In  the  bank, 
isn't  he  ?  Used  to  be.  Well,  he  might  be  with 
out  your  knowing  it.  Queer  genius — his  father 
don't  know  what  to  do  with  him.  He's  kind  of 
in  the  background,  as  it  were.  How  did  you 
happen  to  go  over  there  ?" 

"  Papers  to  sign.  Mr.  Brain ard  was  at  home, 
sick.  It  was  something  that  they  could  hardly 
give  to  any  of  the  boys  to  manage.  I  met  his 
other  daughter." 

"  Other  ?  Didn't  know  he  had  any.  Got  two, 
has  he  ?  And  two  sons.  Well,  he's  a  great 
old  father,  from  all  I  hear,  and  I  shouldn't— 
D_ ow— -  n !" 

But  the  elevator  was  too  far  past  them  to  return. 

"Here's  another  coming,"  said  George,  to 
whom  the  indicator  showed  that  a  cab  had  left 
the  top  story  and  was  half  way  down  to  their 
level. 


53 

Ogden  had  now  gone  through  a  novitiate  of 
five  or  six  weeks.  After  his  first  wrench — from 
the  East  to  the  West — his  second  one — from  the 
West  Side  to  the  North  —  seemed  an  unimpor 
tant  matter.  He  had  learned  his  new  neighbor 
hood,  had  made  a  few  acquaintances  there,  had 
become  familiar  with  his  work  at  the  bank ;  and 
the  early  coming  of  his  own  family,  who  had 
elected  to  swell  the  great  westward  movement 
by  the  contribution  of  themselves  and  all  their 
worldly  goods,  helped  him  to  the  feeling  of  be 
ing  tolerably  well  at  home.  From  the  vantage- 
ground  of  a  secure  present  and  a  promising  fut 
ure  he  became  an  interested  observer  of  the  lif 
that  swept  and  swirled  about  him.  He  found 
that  there  might  be  an  inner  quiet  under  all  this 
vast  and  apparently  unregulated  din  :  he  recalled 
how,  in  a  cotton  factory  or  a  copper  foundry, 
the  hands  talked  among  themselves  in  tones 
lower  than  the  average,  rather  than  higher. 
The  rumble  of  drays  and  the  clang  of  street-car  y 
gongs  became  less  disconcerting;  the  town's  \. 
swarming  hordes  presently  appeared  less  sloven 
ly  in  their  dress  and  less  offensive  in  their  man 
ners  than  his  startled  sensibilities  had  found 
them  at  first;  even  their  varied  physiognomies 
began  to  take  on  a  cast  less  comprehensively 
cosmopolitan.  His  walks  through  the  streets 
and  his  journeyings  in  the  public  conveyances 
showed  him  a  range  of  human  types  completely  A 


54 


unknown  to  his  past  experience ;  yet  it  soon 
came  to  seem  possible  that  all  these  different 
elements  might  be  scheduled,  classified,  brought 
into  a  sort  of  catalogue  raisonne  which  should 
give  every  feature  its  proper  place — skulls,  fore 
heads,  gaits,  odors,  facial  angles ;  ears,  with  their 
different  shapes  and  sets ;  eyes,  with  their  va 
rying  shapes  and  colors ;  hair,  with  its  divergent 
shades  and  textures ;  noses,  with  their  multiplied 
turns  and  outlines ;  dialects,  brogues,  patois,  ac 
cents  in  all  their  palatal  and  labial  varieties  and 
according  to  all  the  different iations  in  pharynx, 
larynx,  and  epiglottis. 

He  disposed  as  readily  of  the  Germans,  Irish, 
and  Swedes  as  of  the  negroes  and  the  Chinese. 
But  how  to  tell  the  Poles  from  the  Bohemi 
ans  ?  How  to  distinguish  the  Sicilians  from  the 
Greeks?  How  to  catalogue  the  various  grades 
of  Jews  ?  How  to  tabulate  the  Medes,  and  the 
Elamites,  and  the  Cappadocians,  and  the  dwell 
ers  from  Mesopotamia? 

During  the  enforced  leisure  of  his  first  weeks 
he  had  gone  several  times  to  the  City  Hall,  and 
had  ascended  in  the  elevator  to  the  reading-room 
of  the  public  library.  On  one  of  these  occasions 
a  heavy  and  sudden  down-pour  had  filled  the 
room  with  readers  and  had  closed  all  the  win 
dows.  The  down-pour  without  seemed  but  a 
trifle  compared  with  the  confused  cataract  of 
conflicting  nationalities  within,  and  the  fumes 


55 


of  incense  that  the  united  throng  caused  to  rise 
upon  the  altar  of  learning  stunned  him  with  a 
sudden  and  sickening  surprise — the  bogs  of  Kil 
kenny,  the  dung-heaps  of  the  Black  Forest,  the 
miry  w&ys  of  Transylvania  and  Little  Russia 
had  all  contributed  to  it. 

The  universal  brotherhood  of  man  appeared^ 
before  him,  and  it  smelt  of  mortality — no  par/ 
tial,  exclusive  mortality,  but  a  mortality  compre 
hensive,  universal,  condensed  and  averaged  up 
from  the  grand  totality  of  items. 

In  a  human  maelstrom,  of  which  such  a  scene 
was  but  a  simple  transitory  eddy,  it  was  grateful 
to  regain  one's  bearings  in  some  degree,  and  to 
get  an  opportunity  for  meeting  one  or  two  fa 
miliar  drops.  It  had  pleased  him,  therefore,  to 
find  that  Brainard's  house  was  in  the  neighbor 
hood  of  Union  Park  and  in  the  immediate  vicin 
ity  of  his  own  first  lodgings ;  and  when  he  went 
over  there  with  his  documents  in  his  pocket  he 
appreciated  the  privilege  of  ringing  the  bell  of  a 
door  behind  which  were  one  or  two  faces  that  he 
might  recognize. 

The  Brainards  lived  on  a  corner,  and  the  house 
was  so  set  as  to  allow  a  narrow  strip  of  yard 
along  the  side  street.  It  was  built  in  the  yellow 
limestone  which  used  to  come  from  quarries  at 
Joliet,  and  the  architect  had  shown  his  prefer 
ence  for  the  exaggerated  keystones  that  had  so 
great  a  vogue  in  the  late  sixties.  The  house  had 


56 


a  basement,  and  above  the  elaborate  wooden  cor 
nice  there  was  a  mansard  with  several  windows 
that  were  set  in  a  frame- work  of  clumsy  and 
pretentious  carpentry.  Behind  the  house  was  a 
brick  stable ;  it  had  been  built  of  cheap  material 
and  covered  with  a  cheaper  red  wash.  The 
dampness  of  the  lower  walls  had  caused  this 
wash  to  discolor  and  then  to  fall  off  altogether. 
Around  the  premises  there  ran  an  old-fashioned 
iron  fence ;  it  stood  on  a  stone  coping  that  was 
covered  with  perpendicular  streaks  of  yellow 
rust.  In  the  yard  a  meandering  asphalt  walk 
led  past  a  few  lilacs  and  syringas,  which  were 
looked  down  upon  by  a  painful  side  porch  that 
nobody  ever  used.  The  walk  in  front  of  the 
house  was  of  stone ;  that  at  the  side  was  of  plank 
and  showed  three  long  lines  of  nail-heads. 

The  interior,  so  far  as  it  came  under  Ogden's 
notice,  was  furnished  with  a  horrible  yet  consist 
ent  simplicity.  The  large  rooms  were  set  spare 
ly  with  chairs,  tables,  and  sofas  that  represented 
the  spoil  of  Centralia,  and  there  were  few  mod 
ern  additions  to  introduce  discords.  An  ideal 
sculptured  head,  placed  on  a  marble  pedestal 
swathed  in  a  fringed  scarf  of  saffron  silk  and  set 
between  the  lace  curtains  so  as  to  show  from  the 
street,  would  have  ruined  the  effect  both  within 
and  without.  Perhaps  the  same  might  be  said 
of  any  other  house. 

Brainard  himself  was  not  visible ;  he  was  only 


57 

audible.  His  deep  voice  came  in  a  sort  of  dead 
ened  growl  through  the  closed  door  of  a  small 
side  room ;  and  mingled  with  it  were  the  queru 
lous  tones  of  a  woman's  voice — an  elderly  wom 
an,  a  woman  in  poor  health,  a  woman  whom 
some  sudden  and  distressful  stroke  had  brought 
to  the  verge  of  tears. 

The  house  had  been  built  in  the  primitive 
days  when  local  architecture  was  still  in  such 
exact  accord  with  local  society  that  anything 
like  graded  receptions  was  undreamed  of.  Every 
body  who  seemed  too  good  to  be  kept  waiting  in 
the  hall  was  shown  into  the  front  parlor.  This 
room  had  a  carpet  whose  design  was  in  large 
baskets  of  bright  flowers,  and  a  ceiling  that  was 
frescoed  in  a  manner  derived  from  a  former  style 
of  railroad  decoration.  This  scheme  of  decora 
tion  centred  around  a  massive  and  contorted 
chandelier  with  eight  globes.  Nobody  had  ever 
seen  the  whole  eight  "  going  "  at  one  time.  Lin 
coln  and  his  family  were  on  one  side  of  the  mar 
ble  mantel-piece;  Grant  and  his  family  on  the 
other. 

It  was  in  this  room  that  Ogden  was  received 
by  the  elder  daughter  of  the  house.  She  seemed 
a  quiet,  self -poised  girl,  four  or  five  years  the 
senior  of  her  sister.  She  amply  filled  her  gown 
of  gray  woollen  ;  her  hair  was  drawn  back  from 
her  forehead  and  made  a  knot  just  above  the 
nape  of  her  neck.  She  had  a  pair  of  cool,  steady 


58 


gray  eyes.  She  appeared  wholesome,  stable,  ca 
pable  of  keeping  herself  well  in  hand. 

"  My  father  isn't  able  to  see  you,"  she  said ; 
"  but  if  you  will  give  me  what  you  have  brought 
I  will  take  it  to  him." 

There  was  a  tremulousness  in  her  voice,  quite 
at  variance  with  her  manner  and  appearance. 
She  put  out  her  hand  with  a  wavering  motion ; 
the  flaring  of  the  gas  in  her  face  seemed  to  strike 
her  with  a  positive  pain. 

A  door  opened  suddenly  and  her  brother  Burt 
came  in.  He  was  a  stocky  young  man  three  or 
four  years  older  than  Ogden.  He  seemed  stuffed 
with  importance  both  present  and  future,  both 
personal  and  parental — he  was  himself  and  his 
father  rolled  into  one. 

"  Abbie,"  he  said,  in  a  sharp,  curt  way,  "  I 
wish  you'd  find  father  the  copy  of  that  report 
you  made  for  him  yesterday."  He  looked  at  Og 
den  in  a  fashion  that  changed  the  young  man 
from  a  person  to  a  thing.  "  We  have  been  look 
ing  for  you  some  time,"  he  said.  "  I'll  take  those 
papers  myself." 

He  spoke  in  a  way  that  was  abrupt  and  auto 
cratic.  Ogden  recognized  it  as  the  utterance  of 
a  masterful  nature,  but  he  was  unable  to  see  that 
the  masterful  nature  was  moved  by  an  emotion 
that  must  be  controlled  and  concealed.  His  in 
dignation  made  no  allowance  for  this,  and  his 
subsequent  ten  minutes  of  solitary  reflection  left 


59 


a  bitterness  that  passed  away  but  lingeringly. 
More  and  more,  with  every  moment  of  this  short 
wait,  did  he  feel  himself  a  gentleman  turned  into 
a  lackey  by  his  inferiors. 

There  was  no  salve  for  his  wounded  sensibili 
ties  save,  perhaps,  in  the  look  of  dumb  expostula 
tion  which  the  girl  cast  upon  her  brother  and  in 
the  few  commonplace  words  which  she  addressed 
to  their  caller  before  she  went  out. 

"  Kindly  wait  a  few  moments,  and  the  papers 
will  be  ready  to  take  back.  Perhaps  you  will 
find  this  other  chair  more  comfortable." 

It  was  after  this  fashion  that  he  first  met  Ab- 
bie  Brainard ;  met  her — as  he  reported  it  to  Mc 
Dowell — and  hardly  more. 

He  followed  his  brother-in-law  into  the  ele 
vator  and  they  dropped  swiftly  to  the  ground 
floor.  At  this  level  is  situated  the  Acme  Lunch 
Koom. 


MCDOWELL  took  a  cup  of  tea  and  an  expedi 
tious  doughnut  standing,  and  hurried  away.  Og- 
den,  who  had  not  overcome  his  habit  of  leisurely 
eating,  lingered  behind. 

The  Acme  occupies  a  square,  low-ceiled  room 
in  the  hindermost  corner  of  the  Clifton :  perhaps, 
with  a  lower  ceiling  and  a  situation  on  a  level 
lower  still,  it  would  have  been  called  the  Zenith. 
It  is  fitted  up  with  three  or  four  oval  counters, 
and  a  very  close  calculation  of  space  allows  room 
for  an  infinitesimal  cashier's  desk  as  well.  Each 
oval  encloses  a  high  rack  that  is  heaped  with 
rolls,  buns,  and  cakes,  and  close  to  each  rack 
stands  a  brace  of  big,  cylindrical,  nickel-plated 
tanks  that  yield  coffee  and  tea.  Each  oval  is 
fringed  with  a  row  of  stools— hard-wood  tops  on 
a  cast-iron  base ;  and  in  warm  weather  a  pair  of 
fans,  which  are  moved  by  power  supplied  from 
the  engine-room,  revolve  aloft  and  agitate  the 
stifling  atmosphere. 

Ogden  had  spent  the  past  week  in  trying  a 
succession  of  dairies,  lunch-rooms,  and  restau 
rants,  and  had  ended  by  returning  to  the  Acme, 
which  seemed  as  decent  and  convenient  as  any. 


61 


He  found  a  place  in  a  quiet  corner ;  ordered  his 
coffee,  wheat-muffins,  and  pie,  which  all  came  to 
gether;  and  fell  to  work  with  his  eye  soberly 
iixed  on  the  shining  expanse  of  the  freshly-wiped 
counter.  Was  he  consistent,  he  wondered,  in 
claiming  any  great  consideration  until  he  could 
lunch  at  a  higher  figure  than  fifteen  or  twenty 
cents  ? 

The  girl  who  had  waited  on  him  turned  away, 
but  another  one,  who  stood  a  little  distance  off, 
called  her  back. 

"  Here,  Maggie,  change  that  mince.  This  gen 
tleman  don't  want  a  piece  with  a  whole  corner 
knocked  off." 

Ogden  buttered  his  muffin  without  raising  his 
eyes.  The  second  girl  herself  placed  the  new 
cut  of  pie  before  him  and  stood  looking  down 
upon  him.  The  hour  was  a  little  late,  and  but 
three  or  four  customers  held  places  around  the 
counters.  Presently  she  spoke. 

"  Well,  Mister  Ogden,"  she  said,  with  a  humor 
ous  tartness,  "  you  don't  seem  to  recognize  your 
old  friends." 

Ogden  threw  up  his  head.  "  Why,  Nealie,  is 
this  you !"  he  exclaimed.  It  was  a  girl  who  had 
helped  wait  on  table  at  his  West  Side  boarding- 
house. 

She  wore  a  dark  dress  with  a  plain  white  col 
lar.  Her  brows  made  two  fine  straight  lines 
over  the  yellowish  green  of  her  eyes.  She  had  a 


62 


strong,  decided  face,  yet  there  was  a  certain  lurk 
ing  delicacy  in  the  outlines  of  nose  and  chin. 

"That's  what,"  she  replied.  "I've  made  a 
change,  you  see.  Been  here  pretty  near  a  week. 
Come  in  often  ?" 

"  I'm  in  the  building.  What  was  the  matter 
with  your  other  place  ?" 

The  girl  hitched  up  her  shoulders.  "  The  fact 
of  it  is,  I  couldn't  get  used  to  it.  Never  tried 
anything  like  that  before." 

She  looked  about  cautiously  and  then  resumed 
in  a  confidential  voice, 

"  To  tell  the  truth,  I  was  just  forced  into  it. 
Pa  and  ma  didn't  want  me  to  come  to  Chicago, 
but  I  couldn't  make  out  that  I  was  going  to  have 
any  terrible  great  show  there  in  Pewaukee.  I 
didn't  s'pose  it  was  going  to  be  so  awful  hard  to 
find  something  to  do  in  a  big  place  like  this.  But 
I  made  up  my  mind,  all  the  same,  that  I  wasn't 
going  to  cave  in  and  go  back  to  Wisconsin — not 
straight  off,  anyway.  Kept  right  on  trotting 
about.  Any  port  in  a  storm,  says  I.  And  when 
I  met  that  good  old  soul  in  the  intelligence  office, 
that  settled  it.  She  only  wanted  a  second  girl ; 
but  I  thought  I  could  stand  it." 

"Couldn't  you?" 

"  I  didn't  tell  ma,  though,  that  I  was  living 
out.  I  wrote  to  her  that  I  was  clerking — ten 
dollars  a  week.  Ten  dollars ! — I'm  looking  for 
the  girl  that  gets  more  than  six.  I  don't  know 


63 


what  the  folks  would  have  thought  if  they'd 
known  of  me  a- being  ordered  around  by  a  lot  of 
young  fellers — run  and  fetch  and  carry  for  a 
parcel  of  strangers.  It  don't  come  natural  to 
me  to  be  bossed,  I  can  tell  you." 

"  But  Mrs.  Gore  used  you  well  ?" 

u  She  did,  for  a  fact.  But  it  wasn't  the  sort  of 
thing  I  wanted  at  all.  So  I  told  her  I  guessed 
I'd  go.  '  Well,'  says  she,  sort  of  resigned  like, 
*  if  you've  made  up  your  mind  to,  you  must,  I 
s'pose ' ;  she  was  sorry  to  lose  me,  I  know.  She 
walked  to  the  basement  door  with  me  to  say 
good-by — with  her  specs  on  top  of  her  head. 
i  Be  a  good  girl,'  says  she,  l  and  let  us  hear  from 
you' — 'most  exactly  what  ma  said  when  I  came 
away.  Gray  hair,  just  like  ma's,  too.  '  Yes, 
ma'am,'  says  I.  I  didn't  say  '  ma'am '  because  I 
thought  I  was  a  servant — I  wasn't ;  but  because 
she  Avas  older  and  because  I  had  a  respect  for 
her.  And  so  I  shall  let  her  hear  from  me  ;  when 
I  get  along  a  little  further  I'm  going  to  call  on 
her.  And  I'm  going  to  get  along,  let  me  tell 
you ;  I  haven't  jumped  on  to  this  hobby-horse  of 
a  town  just  to  stay  still." 

She  nodded  her  head  with  great  decision. 

"  It  broke  her  all  up  when  you  went  away," 
she  resumed.  "  She  kept  a-wondering  for  two 
or  three  days  what  the  matter  was.  Poor  soul, 
she's  a  good  deal  too  tender  for  this  town.  What 
was  the  matter?" 


64 


"  Nothing.  I  had  friends  in  a  different  part  of 
the  city." 

"  In  a  different  paht  of  the  city,"  she  repeated. 
She  spread  her  palms  far  apart  on  the  inner 
edge  of  the  counter  and  brought  her  face  down 
almost  to  a  level  with  his.  "D'you  know,  I 
always  liked  the  way  you  talked ;  it's  real  gen 
teel.  And  you  say  '  cahn't,' too.  And'dinnuh' 
and  'suppuh.'  Hardly  anybody  says  'cahnV 
around  here — except  actors.  Say,  I  went  the 
other  night.  It  cost  fifty  cents ;  but  I  was  just 
wild  to  see  a  real  out-and-out  city  show — couldn't 
hold  in  any  longer.  They  all  talked  kind  of  arti 
ficial,  except  one  man.  He  had  a  bad  part — err 
ing  son,  sort  o'.  He  talked  right  out  in  plain, 
every-day  style,  and  he  was  about  the  only  one  I 
really  cared  for.  Of  course,  though,  I  don't  like 
bad  men  better  than  good  ones.  But  your  way 
is  nice,  after  all." 

"Thanks." 

"  Well,  I'm  in.  a  different  par-r-t  of  the  city 
myself."  She  gave  a  comprehensive  glance  over 
the  sizzling  coffee-urns.  "  Second  in  command." 
She  tapped  her  breast-bone.  "  I  don't  think  so 
everlasting  much  of  Duggan  here,  but  he  recog 
nizes  talent.  It  didn't  take  him  long  to  find  out 
what  I  was  and  he  raised  me.  I  boss  and  help 
around  when  there's  a  rush,  and  now  and  then  I 
take  the  cashier's  place.  It's  all  just  like  a  store. 
Oh,"  she  proceeded,  after  a  shrewd  look  at  him, 


65 

"I  know  well  enough  what  you've  been  think 
ing  all  this  time.  But  here's  your  counter  and 
there's  your  goods ;  and  people  just  say  what 
they  want  and  get  a  check  for  it  and  pay  at 
the  door.  No  boarding-house  in  that,  is  there? 
They  don't  bulldoze  us  very  much." 

The  door  opened  and  a  belated  clerk  came 
in. 

"  Here,  Gretchen,"  she  called  to  one  of  her 
force,  "  see  what  this  man  wants."  The  new 
comer  dropped  mechanically  on  to  one  of  the 
stools  and  submissively  took  the  damaged  pie 
that  had  been  taken  away  from  Ogden.  He  had 
ordered  apple. 

"  Most  of  'em  are  tractable  enough,"  she  com 
mented. 

"  I've  got  ten  girls  here,"  were  her  next  words, 
"  and  they're  quite  a  fair  lot.  But  that  moon- 
eyed  German  girl  over  there — " 

"  Gretchen  ?" 

"  I  call  her  Gretchen ;  she  don't  look  as  if  she 
knew  beans,  does  she?  Well,  she  don't.  She 
was  going  on  in  the  pantry  yesterday  about  the 
rights  of  man.  I  knew  she  was  due  to  break  a 
saucer  pretty  soon.  Well,  she  did.  And  we've 
got  a  Swede  girl  here  who  would  be  the  best  all- 
around  one  of  the  lot  if  it  wasn't  for  her  temper. 
All  of  a  sudden  she  gets  mad  and  she  stays  mad, 
and  you  can't  for  the  life  of  you  find  out  what 
it  was  that  made  her  mad.  Those  three  Irish 
5 


66 


girls  are  pretty  smart.  H'm,  yes ;  they  were 
rigging  up  a  strike  Tuesday.  They  wanted  fifty 
cents  a  week  more.  They  found  out  their  want 
at  a  quarter  to  twelve.  <  All  right,  girls,'  says  I, 
;  you  can  go  out  if  you  want.  Our  regular  peo 
ple  will  kick  and  go  somewhere  else  for  a  few 
days,  perhaps ;  but  the  first  rainy  noon,  they'll 
all  come  in  again,  and  they'll  see  that  things  are 
running  all  right  with  a  new  crew,  and  after  that 
they'll  stay.'  Goodness  me !  I've  heard  more 
about  rights  and  less  about  duties  this  last  week 
than  I  ever  did  before  in  my  life.  My  uncle 
says  it's  the  same  with  him.  He's  the  engineer 
here.  He  really  got  me  this  place.  If  you  look 
down,  through  that  grating  out  there  as  you  go 
along  you  may  see  him.  It's  talk  and  argue  all 
the  time — his  men  have  more  half-baked  notions 
than  you  can  think  of,  and  he's  kept  on  the 
k'jump  all  the  time  looking  after  things.  Do  1 
kick  ?  Do  /  squeal  ?  Not  much.  And  if  I  had 
come  in  from  outside  with  a  different  language, 
maybe,  and  a  different  training  and  a  different 
set  of  notions,  and  if  I  had  been  a  real,  dyed-in- 
the-wool,  down-trodden  peasant  and  all  my  folks 
the  same  for  nobody  knows  how  far  back,  per 
haps  I'd  find  some  reason  there  for  not  keeping 
abreast  with  the  tolerably  smart  lot  of  people 
that  had  let  me  in." 

She  cast  a  lofty  eye  over  her  various  under 
lings.     "Kind  of  a  plain  lot,  ain't  we?    You 


67 


know  there's  one  place  like  this  in  town  where 
they  won't  take  a  girl  unless  she's  pretty.  Their 
cashier  is  a  regular  bute.  But  I  wouldn't  work 
in  such  a  place ;  no,  indeed." 

She  paused.  Ogden  made  no  response.  She 
eyed  him  with  a  sharp  impatience. 

"  Not  but  what  I  could,  though,  if  I  had  a 
mind,"  she  remarked,  with  a  vindictive  little  ex 
plosion. 

"  No,  I  couldn't,  either,"  she  added  suddenly ; 
"  they're  all  brunettes  this  year." 

And  she  laughed  forgivingly. 

"And  you  don't  see  me  a-wearing  rings  and 
chains,"  she  pursued ;  "I  guess  not.  And  I 
sha'n't,  either,  until  I  finish  my  course." 

"  Course  "  ?  Was  she  hinting  at  the  close  of 
her  earthly  career  ? 

"  Yep.  Shorthand.  But  don't  hurry  away." 
He  had  dropped  his  feet  to  the  floor.  "  Duggan 
went  right  off  after  the  rush,  and  I  guess  I've 
been  hard  pushed  enough  to  enjoy  a  little  rest 
ful  conversation.  Shorthand  and  typewriting — 
that's  what  I'm  steering  for.  I'll  stand  this  for 
a  while — until  I  can  do  eighty  words.  I've  be 
gun  at  the  Athenaeum  already.  I  don't  see  why 
anybody  should  want  to  take  'lessons'  in  type 
writing  ;  it's  practice  you  want.  Same  with  the 
other.  Well,  I'm  practising  hard  enough.  I- 
shall-be  ready  for  J-usiness  in-three-months,"  she 
traced  with  her  finger  on  the  counter,  giving  con- 


G8 


siderable  pressure  to  the  "b"  in  "business." 
"  I'm  ahead  of  the  class  now. 

"  I'm  educated,  too,"  she  continued.  "  I  taught 
school  one  term  up  in  Waukesha  County.  I 
know  how  to  spell — you  ought  to  see  how  some 
of  those  girls  write  out  their  notes.  And  I  can 
punctuate — semicolons  just  as  easy  as  anything 
else.  Say,  do  you  know  Mrs.  Granger  S.  Bates  ?" 

"I've  seen  her  name  in  the  papers,"  said  Og- 
den,  emptying  his  glass  and  feeling  in  his  pocket 
for  his  handkerchief. 

"  Sorry  we  don't  give  napkins.  Well,  she  was 
a  school-teacher,  and  look  at  her  now.  I  went 
by  her  house  on  Calumet  Avenue  last  Sunday. 
She's  got  about  everything.  She  is  one  of  the 
patronesses  of  the  Charity  Ball.  Still,  I  suppose 
she  must  be  getting  along  in  years — her  husband 
has  come  to  be  the  Lord  High  Muck-a-muck  of 
Most  Everything ;  I've  read  about  him  for  years. 
Hope  /  haven't  got  to  wait  till  I'm  fifty  to  have 
a  good  time." 

Ogden  was  shuffling  his  feet  on  the  floor. 

"  Won't  you  have  another  piece  of  pie?  No? 
Well,  try  a  cream-puff,  then ;  it  '11  be  my  treat. 
And  do  take  time  with  it.  Anything  but  fifty 
men  eating  away  like  a  house  afire." 

Only  one  other  customer  remained.  The 
Swede  girl  began  to  collect  the  cream- jugs. 

"  I  don't  care  so  extra  much  about  Mrs.  Bates, 
though.  But  there's  Mrs.  Arthur  J.  Ingles,  three- 


69 


hundred-and-something  Ontario  Street — do  you 
know  her  f  Now  there's  a  woman  that  interests 
me.  She's  in  the  papers  every  day;  she  goes 
everywhere.  She's  'way  up,  I  guess  ;  I'd  be  wild 
if  she  wasn't.  She  was  at  a  dance  last  Tuesday, 
and  she  gave  a  reception  the  day  before,  and  her 
sister  is  going  to  be  married  next  month.  It's 
easy  to  follow  folks  since  the  papers  began  to 
print  their  names  all  bunched  up  the  way  they 
do,  and  Mrs.  Arthur  J.  is  one  that  I've  followed 
pretty  close.  She  must  be  young — I  never  see 
his  name  except  with  hers.  I  guess  he's  just  a 
society  dude.  Well,  dudes  are  all  right ;  you've 
got  to  have  'em  in  a  big  town.  You  wouldn't 
have  the  whole  million  and  a  half  of  us  be  grub 
bers  ?" 

"  I  suppose  not." 

"  She  gave  a  dinner  last  week.  Covers  were 
laid  for  ten — what  does  that  mean  ?" 

"  Probably  that  she  and  her  husband  had 
eight  people." 

"  She  wore  heliotrope  satin.  Ornaments,  dia 
monds.  Great,  wasn't  it?  One  of  our  girls 
brought  down  a  book  this  morning  about  Lady 
Guinevere.  Guinevere  —  your  grandmother  ! 
What  are  we  to  Lady  Guinevere,  or  what  is 
Lady  Guinevere  to  us  ?  But  when  it  comes  to 
people  living  in  your  own  town,  why,  that's  get 
ting  down  to  business.' ' 

"  Yes,  let  us  talk  about  realities — Balzac." 


70 


"  I  should  say  so,"  she  assented,  missing  the 
allusion.  "  Now  then,  why  shouldn't  /  be  wear 
ing  heliotrope  satin  to  dinner  some  time  ? — if  not 
tinder  the  name  of  Cornelia  MclSTabb,  then  under 
some  other  as  good  or  better.  Anyway,  I'm  go 
ing  to  keep  my  hands  as  nice  as  I  can ;  a  girl 
never  knows  what  she  may  have  a  chance  to  be 
come.  I  don't  imagine  it  will  disfigure  me  much 
to  run  a  typewriter.  Dear  me,"  she  sighed, 
"  how  much  time  I've  lost !  If  I  hadn't  been 
such  a  darned  goose,  I  might  have  begun  Pitman 
at  home  a  year  ago." 

She  reached  down  under  the  counter  and 
pulled  a  newspaper  up  out  of  a  dark  corner. 

"  Some  lunch-rooms  have  papers  around — as 
many  as  a  dozen,  sometimes  ;  but  Duggan  says 
this  place  is  too  cramped  for  him  to  give  people 
any  inducement  to  dilly-dally.  It's  eat  and  run. 
So  I  have  to  buy  my  own.  This  is  the  first 
chance  I've  had  to  look  at  it.  I  wonder  what 
she's  been  up  to  now." 

She  opened  the  paper  and  ran  down  its  col 
umns  with  an  expert  eye. 

"  Yes,  here  she  is,  first  pop.  Mr.  and  Mrs. — 
Cluett,  Parker,  Ingles.  My  sakes,  how  I  envy 
that  woman !  Course  I  don't  want  that  she 
should  come  down  here  and  wash  my  dishes, 
but  wouldn't  I  like  to  go  up  there  and  eat  off  of 
hers !  What  did  she  wear  ? — it  don't  tell.  Where 
was  it  ? — at  Mrs.  Walworth  Floyd's — a  small  din- 


71 


ner.  Don't  know  them.  How  about  the  Misses  f 
— Jameson,  Parker,  Wentworth  —  she's  a  great 
goer,  too.  And  here  are  a  few  Messrs. — John 
son,  J.  L.  Cluett,  George  Ogden — " 

She  stopped  abruptly. 

"  You  ?" 

There  was  a  world  of  reproach  in  her  voice. 

"  Yes." 

"  And  you  sit  there  and  never  let  on !  You're 
as  mean  as  you  can  be.  What  is  she  like  ?  Tell 
me,  do.  Ain't  she  young,  now  ?  What  did  she 
wear  ?" 

"  I  didn't  go.     I  had  a  trip  to  the  West  Side." 

"  Your  name's  here." 

"  The  reporters  get  the  names  in  advance. 
Sometimes  they  copy  them  from  cards  or  re 
grets." 

u  And  you  wasn't  there  ?" 
'    "No." 

"  Too  bad  !    But  you've  seen  her  ?" 

"  Never." 

"  How  hateful !    But  you  was  really  invited  ?" 

«  Yes." 

"  H'm  !"  she  said,  deliberately ;  "I  see  now 
why  you  moved.  I  don't  blame  you.  I'm  try 
ing  to  get  along,  too.  We're  both  in  the  same 
boat." 

Ogden  rose. 

"  What  else  is  there  ?"  she  asked  herself,  look 
ing  over  other  columns.  "  Here's  a  marriage  ; 


it's  in  Milwaukee.  Don't  know  whether  it's  a 
society  item  or  not.  Who  are  they  ? — J.  Russell 
Yibert  is  the  man,  and  Mary  Adelaide  Brainard 
is  the  woman.  Both  of  Chicago — know  'em  ?" 

Ogden  sat  down  suddenly. 

She  eyed  him  curiously. 

"  That's  the  first  sign  I've  seen  that  you  was 
willing  to  stay  a  single  minute  longer  than  you 
had  to.  You  can  go  now,  whenever  you  want. 
We've  got  to  clean  up.  So  long !" 


YI 

OGDEN  had  been  balked  in  his  first  social  ad 
vance  by  the  inconsiderate  and  unwarranted 
demands  of  the  Brainards.  He  failed  on  Propo 
sition  No.  I.,  but  its  attendant  corollary  he  dis 
posed  of  after  the  proper  interval.  He  had 
missed  the  dinner,  but  he  accomplished  the  din 
ner  call. 

He  was  moving  around  his  room  in  his  shirt 
sleeves  ;  he  had  the  leisurely  air  of  one  whose 
social  orbit  was  so  small  as  to  involve  no  rela 
tions  with  the  courses  of  cabs  and  of  street-cars. 
To  set  himself  right  with  the  Floyds  he  had  but 
to  step  around  the  corner. 

His  room  was  rather  small  and  cramped,  but 
he  had  preferred  indifferent  accommodations  in 
a  good  house  to  good  accommodations  in  an  in 
different  house — just  as  he  would  have  chosen 
an  indifferent  house  in  a  good  neighborhood  to 
a  better  house  in  a  poorer  one.  His  quarters, 
however,  were  well  enough  for  a  single  young 
man  of  moderate  pretensions.  He  had  space  for 
a  three-quarter  bed,  a  bureau,  a  wash-stand  which 
displayed  a  set  of  pink-flowered  crockery  and 
two  towels,  a  cane-seated  chair,  and  a  pair  of 


74 


book-shelves  on  the  wall.  And  by  means  of  a 
good  deal  of  dexterous  manoeuvring  he  con 
trived  to  extract  some  comfort  from  an  under 
sized  rocker.  His  decorations  were  principally 
photographs,  which  showed  to  the  extent  com 
mon  under  the  circumstances.  Some  of  these 
were  grouped  in  twos  and  threes,  in  frames  faced 
with  Chinese  silk;  they  helped  to  achieve  the 
disordered  and  over-crowded  effect  that  the  pres 
ent  taste  in  house -furnishing  aims  at,  and  can 
always  accomplish  in  a  back  hall  bedroom. 

The  photographs  stood  in  the  position  in  which 
he  had  first  placed  them  a  month  and  a  half  ago, 
although  the  recent  arrival  of  several  of  the 
originals  had  given  their  shadows  an  altered  im 
portance.  Everybody  knows  of  the  inertia  that 
overtakes  decorative  detail,  even  when  portable. 
There  were  the  pictures  of  his  father  and  his 
mother,  arranged  in  a  pair.  His  father  offered 
a  placid,  gray -bearded  face ;  it  seemed  rather 
forceless,  though  that  effect  may  have  been  due 
to  retouching;  yet,  independent  of  any  practi 
cal  processes,  it  was  the  face  of  a  man  who 
obviously  could  not  have  risen  in  advance  to 
any  adequate  conception  of  the  Western  me 
tropolis. 

The  face  of  his  mother  was  serious,  strenuous. 
She  had  in  some  degree  the  semi-countrified  as 
pect  of  one  who  has  run  a  quiet  course  in  a  quiet 
quarter  of  a  minor  town. 


75 


His  sister's  picture  had  been  taken  in  the  East 
just  before  her  starting  for  her  new  home.  It 
was  now  in  the  hands  of  Ogden's  next  -  door 
neighbor,  who  had  come  in  carrying  a  choice  of 
white  ties,  and  who  now  wove  around  it  a  con 
templative  cloud  of  tobacco-smoke  from  his  briar- 
wood  pipe.  He  was  a  young  man  with  a  high 
forehead  and  a  pair  of  shrewd  but  kindly  brown 
eyes. 

"  A  mighty  pretty  girl,"  Brower  said,  heartily. 
"  Get  the  right  kind  of  a  New  England  face, 
and  you  can't  do  much  better.  I  must  haul  out 
my  own  photographs  and  fix  them  up  some 
time." 

Brower  kept  his  collection  in  his  trunk,  along 
with  his  shirts  and  underwear  generally.  He 
used  his  bureau  drawers  for  collars  and  cuffs,  and 
for  a  growing  accumulation  of  newspapers,  mag 
azines,  and  novels.  He  had  been  in  the  house 
two  years,  yet  his  trunk  had  never  been  un 
packed  and  put  away.  He  was  an  adjuster  for 
an  insurance  company,  and  was  subject  to  sud 
den  calls  to  remote  localities,  in  accordance  with 
the  doings  of  the  busy  monster  that  the  press 
knows  as  the  "  fire  fiend."  If  Isaac  Sobrinski, 
off  in  Des  Moines,  had  the  misfortune  to  be 
burned  out,  at  the  close  of  a  dull  season  or  in 
the  face  of  brisk  and  successful  competition, 
then  Des  Moines  was  the  place  to  which  Brower 
immediately  posted.  He  estimated  the  damage 


76 


on  the  building,  figured  the  salvage  on  socks  and 
ulsters,  and  endeavored  to  decide,  so  far  as  lay 
in  his  powers,  whether  the  catastrophe  had  been 
inflicted  by  Providence  or  had  been  precipitated 
by  Sobrinski's  own  match-box.  However,  he 
never  carried  anything  except  his  valise  on  such 
excursions ;  the  general  state  of  his  trunk  is  to 
be  accepted  simply  as  the  mental  index  of  a  con 
stant  and  hurried  traveller. 

"  Yes,  she's  a  mighty  pretty  girl,"  he  repeated, 
thoughtfully.  "  Where  have  they  gone  ?" 

"  Oh,  not  far.  There's  been  a  good  deal  of 
travelling  done  already.  They  just  went  up  to 
Milwaukee ;  Eugene  had  something  to  see  about 
there.  They'll  be  back  to-morrow,  I  expect." 

"  Milwaukee,  eh  ?  That's  come  to  be  quite 
the  fashion,  hasn't  it  ?  Some  folks  go  there  after 
they're  married,  and  some  of  them  to  be  mar 
ried.  "We  had  one  in  our  office  a  week  or  two 
ago  ;  Yibert — have  you  met  him  ?" 

"  It's  in  your  office  he  is,  then,  is  it?  No,  I've 
never  met  him.  I've  seen  him  and  heard  about 
him.  Is  he  much  thought  of  ?" 

"Well,  the  office  doesn't  have  a  great  deal  to 
say  to  a  man  as  long  as  he  keeps  hours  and  at 
tends  to  his  work — when  the  position  isn't  re 
sponsible,  I  mean.  What  are  you  looking  for 
— whisk -broom?  Here;  I'm  sitting  on  it,  I 
guess." 

"  I  suppose  he  does  attend  to  his  work  ?" 


77 

"  Oh,  so-so ;  but  a  little  break  like  that  doesn't 
help  a  man  any.  He  struck  high,  didn't  he?" 

"  Yes." 

"  Wonder  what  he's  got  to  keep  her  on.  Great 
question — all  that ;  ain't  it  ?  She's  a  rich  girl,  I 
hear.  Subject  for  debate  :  is  it  safer  to  marry  a 
rich  girl  or  a  poor  girl — for  a  young  man  in  mod 
erate  circumstances,  I  mean?" 

"  Oh,  dear,"  said  Ogden,  sitting  down  on  the 
edge  of  the  bed,  helplessly ;  "if  you're  going 
back  to  that  chestnut !" 

"  Well,  it's  timely,"  rejoined  Brower,  knock 
ing  the  ashes  of  his  pipe  into  the  cover  of  the 
soap-dish ;  "  and  always  will  be.  Pro :  if  the 
girl's  rich,  she'll  have  had  things,  and  got  used 
to  them,  and  perhaps  tired  of  them.  If  the 
girl's  poor,  she'll  be  ravenous  after  her  long 
starve-out,  and  will  expect  her  husband  to  feed 
her  with  everything." 

"  Lay  on." 

"  Con :  if  the  girl's  rich,  she'll  expect  all  the 
comforts  and  luxuries  she  has  been  used  to  at 
home.  If  she's  poor,  she'll  have  had  some  sense 
ground  into  her ;  she'll  know  how  to  manage 
and  contrive.  So  there  it  is.  What's  your  idea  ?" 

"  No  general  rule.    Depends  on  circumstances." 

"  What  does  ?" 

«  The  girl.     To  begin  with." 

"The  girl  depends  on  circumstances.  And 
after  ?" 


78 


"  After  ?  Oh,  then  circumstances  depend  on 
the  girl." 

"IPm!  Can't  lay  down  any  general  law — 
same  as  with  little  Johnny.  Pshaw!  You  go 
to  the  foot." 

But  they  both  agreed  on  one  point,  as  young 

men  alwa}^s  do  when  they  discuss  this  standard 

subject :  they  stood  together  on  the  assumption 

•  that  such  a  venture  concerned  only  the  two  peo- 

I  pie  primarily  involved. 

Brower  preceded  Ogden  into  the  hallway ;  he 
stood  with  the  toe  of  one  slipper  on  the  heel  of 
the  other.  "  Well,  remember  me  to  the  swells." 

"  Oh,  shucks !"  said  George,  turning  back  and 
laughing. 

He  walked  down  and  out  rather  sedately,  and 
picked  his  way  over  the  muddy  sidewalks  with 
his  thoughts  fixed  on  the  two  recent  marriages. 
That  in  his  own  family  had  just  occurred  under 
such  disadvantages  as  must  prevail  in  a  disor 
ganized  household,  and  with  the  infliction  of 
such  discomforts  as  will  sometimes  be  under 
gone  by  people  who,  while  not  in  society,  still 
feel  impelled  to  have  such  a  function  proceed 
after  the  fashion  that  society  prescribes.  Kittie 
Ogden  was  duly  married,  then,  with  a  certain 
regard  to  cards,  carriages,  caterers,  and  the  rest  ,- 
and  the  feast  was  graced  by  a  number  of  Mc 
Dowell's  family  and  friends — people  of  a  fairish 
sort,  who  called  for  little  comment  in  either  way. 


79 


At  least,  little  comment  was  bestowed  by  Og- 
den,  whose  principal  thought  was  that  his  sis 
ter  was  now  the  wife  of  a  fellow  of  some  means 
and  ability,  and  who  felt  that  it  would  not  come 
amiss  to  have  a  good  business  man  in  the  family. 

At  the  Floyds'  he  found  the  other  wedding 
the  subject  of  much  comment,  more  or  less  dis 
creet.  On  the  other  hand,  the  affair  in  his  own 
family  received  but  a  mere  civil  mention  ;  the 
Ogdens,  he  felt,  must  be  only  an  insignificant 
little  group,  after  all.  Must  they— must  he 
al  ways  remain  so  ? 

The  Floyds  occupied  a  snug  little  house  which 
filled  a  chink  between  two  bigger  and  finer  ones, 
and  commanded  a  view  of  the  back  yard  of  a 
third,  which  was  bigger  and  finer  still.  Mrs. 
Floyd  had  lately  begun  to  fill  a  chink  in  the 
social  world  as  well,  by  having  an  "evening." 
She  had  approached  the  idea  with  a  good  deal 
of  deliberation,  and  she  had  achieved  something 
very  small  and  quiet.  She  overcame  her  hus 
band's  weakness  for  knowing  people  and  invit 
ing  them  to  the  house  ;  she  was  not  after  a  del 
uge,  but  a  drop ;  and  if  her  tardy  distillation  did 
not  equal  the  perfumes  of  the  fragrant  East, 
still  it  was  the  best  result  to  be  arrived  at  un 
der  the  circumstances. 

He  found  the  Fairchilds  there,  and  he  came 
upon  Fairchild  and  Floyd  smoking,  sub  r.osa, 
in  a  secluded  corner  of  the  library,  which  was 


80 


furnished  in  a  sombre  and  solid  fashion.  In 
the  Floyd  family  the  household  divinity  was 
the  lace-curtain,  whose  susceptibility  to  offence 
from  the  fumes  of  tobacco  is  well  known ;  her 
high-priestess  was  Mrs.  Floyd,  and  her  chief 
victim  was  "Walworth.  Associated  with  the 
two  smokers  was  young  Freddy  Pratt,  whose 
solicitude  regarding  Brainard's  mental  state  on 
the  occasion  of  his  daughter's  call  at  the  bank 
has  been  already  touched  upon,  and  who  was 
now  puffing  a  cigarette  with  a  learned  and  ex 
pert  air.  This  attitude  was  displeasing  to  Og- 
den,  who  was  perhaps  over -disposed  to  feel 
official  differences  on  social  occasions  ;  but  no 
oppressive  sense  of  his  own  subordinate  rank 
troubled  Freddy  Pratt,  who  had  but  a  feeble 
and  intermittent  realization  of  the  orders  of  the 
business  hierarchy,  or  indeed  of  anything  else. 

"  It  was  a  matter  that  concerned  just  her  and 
him,"  Fairchild  was  saying  as  Ogden  entered, 
with  a  contemplative  regard  fastened  on  the 
lengthening  ash  of  his  cigar.  "  It  was  nobody 
else's  business." 

He  stopped.  He  had  spoken  in  a  low,  quiet 
voice,  but  he  had  conveyed  unmistakably  the 
presence  of  quotation-marks. 

"  I  called  on  'em  the  other  night,"  volunteered 
Freddy  Pratt,  unabashedly.  His  perky  little 
nose  was  tipped  in  the  air,  and  his  eyes  were 
closed  to  the  two  fine  slits  that  denote  the 


81 


complete  enjoyment  of  the  smoker.  "  I  wasn't 
going  to  stand  off.  They're  at  the  Northum 
berland — big  name,  bnt  not  much  else.  Eagged 
matting  in  the  halls,  and  the  janitor  didn't  look 
very  slick.  I  guess  they've  rented  ready  fur 
nished.  Mayme  was  real  glad  to  see  me.  But 
lie  was  rather  grumpy,  I  thought." 

"Everybody  ought  always  to  be  glad  to  see 
you,  Freddy,"  smiled  Wai  worth,  with  a  caress 
ing  irony. 

"  I  suppose,"  resumed  Fairchild,  thought 
fully,  "that  the  human  family  will  always  go 
on  considering  a  wedding  as  a  joyous  occasion. 
It  always  has;  it  always  must — hope  springs 
eternal." 

Ogden  wondered  what  other  view  there  might 
be  to  take.  Everybody  had  seemed  lively  and 
happy  enough  when  Kittie  was  married. 

"But  there's  the  other  side — the  side  that 
turns  to  view  with  a  consideration  of  the  com 
plicated  relations  of  a  good  many  new  and  di 
verse  elements — new  people  coming  in.  We  had 
a  case  in  our  own  family  some  years  ago,  when 
my  young  cousin  married.  Poor  Lizzie ;  she  is 
dead  now.  Her  father  died  six  months  before 
her  and  left  a  good  deal  to  be  divided  up.  Her 
husband  was  trustee  for  the  boy  after  she  her 
self  went,  and  he  made  us  a  good  deal  of  trouble. 
He  had  his  eye  on  the  estate  from  the  start,  and 
more  than  his  share  in  the  handling  of  it.  There 

6 


were  a  good  many  meetings  in  lawyers'  offices 
— more  trying  than  the  courts  themselves.  There 
was  a  good  deal  of  money  lost,  and  there  is  a 
good  deal  of  feeling  that  will  never  be  got  over. 
He  traded  on  his  wife's  memory  all  through. 
Yet  the  family  welcomed  him  very  cordially  and 
trustfully ;  we  thought  the  poor  girl  was  going 
to  be  so  happy.  She  was  ;  she  never  knew." 

Ogden  sighed  ;  this  was  dismal  matter. 

"  Oh,  well,"  continued  Fairchild,  resuming  his 
cigar,  with  an  air  of  passing  to  lighter  topics, 
"this  can't  apply  here.  All  of  us  are  happily 
married  or  are  going  to  be — " 

Freddy  Pratt  nonchalantly  blew  an  ineffable 
smoke-ring  across  the  room  ;  Walworth  slipped 
around  the  table  to  close  the  last  inch  of  crack 
in  the  door. 

"  Oh,  dear,  yes !"  he  exclaimed. 

"  — and  none  of  us  are  being  troubled  through 
relations  by  marriage." 

The  door  was  shut,  but  the  penetrating  voice 
of  Ann  Wilde  came  through  it  clearly,  and  Wal 
worth  winced. 

"  Oh,  dear,  no !"  he  protested. 

"I  should  say  not,"  chimed  in  Freddy  Pratt, 
with  his  self-satisfied  little  ba-a. 

The  cigars  were  ending.  "  Come,  let  us  go  out 
to  the  others,"  said  Floyd. 

In  the  drawing-room  Ogden  presently  encoun 
tered  Jessie  Bradley  and  her  parents.  The  girl 


herself  appeared  as  dressed  as  the  occasion  could 
warrant,  but  her  father  and  mother  wore  the 
every-day  habiliments  in  which  he  had  first  seen 
them,  a  fortnight  before,  on  the  occasion  of  a 
call  at  Hinsdale.  They  had  an  easy-going  aspect, 
as  if  they  hardly  cared  to  put  themselves  out 
greatly.  They  were  present  in  the  triple  capac 
ity  of  relatives  of  the  hostess,  of  suburbanites, 
and  of  body-guard  to  escort  their  daughter  back 
home  after  another  of  her  frequent  visits  in 
town,  and  their  effect  was  quite  provisional  and 
transitory. 

Mrs.  Bradley  was  a  pleasant  woman  whose 
face  was  full  of  the  fine  lines  of  experience  and 
whose  hair  had  thinned  greatly  without  chang 
ing  its  dry,  sandy  brown.  She  wore  an  old- 
fashioned  tortoise-shell  comb.  She  met  Ogden 
here  precisely  as  she  had  met  him  in  her  own 
house.  He  noticed  presently  that  she  treated 
everybody  else  in  exactly  the  same  fashion,  and 
he  learned  subsequently  that  she  had,  practical 
ly,  one  invariable  manner  for  all  times,  places, 
and  people.  It  was  a  manner  that  he  found 
very  quiet,  simple,  straightforward,  and  friendly. 
It  showed  that  she  valued  herself,  and  was  also 
disposed  to  accord  a  good  value  to  anybody  else. 
It  seemed  to  say,  as  plainly  as  words :  "  The 
Lord  is  the  maker  of  us  all;  so  let's  have  no 
more  fuss  about  it."  It  was  the  good  American 
manner  in  full  bloom. 


84 


Her  husband  had  a  jovial  eye,  a  grizzled  mous 
tache,  a  rotund,  polished  forehead,  and  cheeks 
that  hung  downward  fatly  into  his  big,  round, 
short  neck.  He  appeared  to  have  valued  his 
peace  of  mind  sufficiently  to  preserve  it  and  to 
be  satisfied  with  the  moderate  success  that  comes 
from  moderate  effort.  He  wore  a  short- waisted, 
double-breasted  frock  coat,  and  there  were  no 
wrinkles  in  it,  either  front  or  back:  he  would 
have  found  it  impossible  to  thrust  his  plump 
hand  in  between  any  two  of  the  buttons. 

He  was  given  in  the  directory  as  "Bradley, 
Danl.  H.,  secty.  and  treas.  Darrell  &  Bradley 
Pt'g  &  Lith'g  Co."  He  had  been  one  of  the 
organizers  of  the  corporation,  but  had  since 
yielded  the  lead  to  others  of  more  push  and 
means.  He  had  a  moderate  salary  and  a  small 
block  of  the  stock.  Since  he  was  assisting  the 
business  as  an  officer,  rather  than  directing  it  as 
an  individual,  he  had  little  personal  annoyance 
from  typographical  unions  and  from  the  paper 
manufacturers'  trusts.  As  for  "pi"  and  proof 
readers'  errors,  matters  which  have  a  power  to 
make  some  men  agonize,  he  merely  laughed  at 
them.  The  concern,  besides  its  central  establish 
ment,  had  a  few  retail  branches  placed  here  and 
there  through  the  business  district ;  one  of  them, 
on  the  ground  floor  of  the  Clifton,  supplied  the 
La  Salle  Street  banks  and  insurance  offices  with 
ledgers,  ink,  and  blotting-pads 


85 

He  had  an  acre  of  ground  and  a  two-story 
frame  house  at  Hinsdale,  and  Ogden  remembered 
the  small  green-house  where  he  fed  his  craze  for  - 
chrysanthemums. 

"  We  have  come  to  take  our  girl  back  home," 
he  said  to  Ogden  as  he  laid  his  plump  hand 
lightly  on  his  daughter's  shoulder.  "  That  is,  if 
she  can  make  up  her  mind  to  go  with  us." 

"  Just  us  two  all  alone  in  the  house,"  added  her 
mother,  with  a  humorous  pathos.  "No  chick 
nor  child." 

Jessie  laughed  and  shook  out  a  bit  of  her  friv 
olous  finery.  Her  face  had  a  tired  look,  but  mo 
tion  seemed  more  restful  to  her  than  rest  itself. 

Ogden  canvassed  the  three.  Whence  could  this 
girl  have  got  her  supple  leanness,  her  light,  gay, 
rapid,  incisive  air,  her  aspen-like  quiverings  of 
nervous  force?  Not  from  her  parents.  From 
the  March  winds,  perhaps,  that  sweep  down  from 
Mackinaw,  over  the  limy  and  choppy  expanse 
of  Lake  Michigan ;  from  the  varied  breezes,  hot 
and  cold,  that  scour  the  prairies  on  their  way 
from  scorched-up  Texas  or  from  the  snow-fields 
beyond  Manitoba. 

"Not  even  a  relative,"  pursued  her  father; 
"not  one  in  all  the  country  round  —  except 
Frances.  All  our  people  are  down  East,"  he 
continued,  addressing  Ogden  more  directly. 
"  They  write  every  so  often  to  learn  if  we  are 
millionnaires  yet.  We  always  have  to  say  i  no/ 


86 


and  that  discourages  them.  They  stay  where 
they  are." 

"  But  Jessie  goes  around  to  look  after  them," 
contributed  her  mother,  with  combined  com 
placency  and  reproach.  "  She  goes  to  Pittsfield 
and  Nantucket  and  everywhere.  People  are  be 
ginning,  now,  to  ask  her  up  to  "Wisconsin,  sum 
mers.  And  sometimes  Florida." 

The  girl  shrugged  her  shoulders  in  a  fidgety 
fashion. 

"  Oh,  well,  mamma,"  she  said,  "  I  have  to  cir 
culate.  Let's  circulate  some  now,"  she  sug 
gested,  turning  to  Ogden.  "  I'll  be  ready  to  go 
when  you  are,"  she  called  back  to  her  father. 


YII 


have  been  expecting  to  see  you  out  at 
the  house  again,"  she  said  to  the  young  man,  as 
they  settled  on  the  stairs.  They  were  seated  just 
below  the  landing.  Her  dress,  trimmed  writh 
silver  braid  and  little  groups  of  flaunting  bows, 
grazed  his  knees  ;  he  could  number  every  stone 
in  the  rings  that  crowded  her  long,  thin  fingers. 
"  We  didn't  suppose  a  matter  of  eighteen  miles 
would  scare  you." 

"  It  doesn't.     But  you're  never  home." 

"  Oh,  yes,  I  am  —  once  in  a  while.  When  you 
do  favor  us  again,  get  a  time-table  for  the  next 
time  after.  I  never  heard  of  the  4  Q.'  charging 
anything  for  them." 

"  I  will." 

"  Awfully  sudden  about  May  me,  wasn't  it  ?" 
she  said,  with  a  suddenness  of  her  own.  "  I 
didn't  suppose  it  was  going  to  end  like  that  —  at 
least,  not  right  away.  I  dare  say  you  have  been 
noticing  how  Cousin  Frances  looks  at  me,  every 
now  and  then.  You  might  think  /was  the  one 
to  blame.  She's  been  talking  to  mother  about  it 
to-night  —  and  me.  I  guess  I'm  going  home  all 
right  enough." 


"  Don't  you  want  to  ?" 

"  Oh,  I  don't  mind.  But  what's  the  dif.— far 
as  Mayme  is  concerned,  I  mean  ?  She  was  bound 
to  have  him ;  she  wouldn't  have  anybody  else. 
It  was  their  affair,  wasn't  it  ?  Well,  then,  why 
not  let  them  manage  it  ?" 

"  I  suppose  so,"  assented  George,  dubiously. 

"  Her  father  won't  see  her,  I  hear.  I'd  like 
such  a  father.  Her  sister  can't  do  anything  with 
him." 

"  Her  sister  ?" 

"  Yes ;  she's  got  about  as  much  influence  as 
anybody.  Have  you  seen  her  ?" 

"Yes.  Are  you  very  well  acquainted  with 
her  ?"  he  asked. 

"Not  very.  She  belongs  to  the  next  older 
generation." 

u  How  much  older  ?    Two  or  three  years  ?" 

"  Twenty  or  thirty.  She's  about  the  same 
age  as  her  mother.  But  more  useful.  Mayme 
thinks  everything  of  her.  She's  a  good,  steady, 
plodding  stay-at-home.  She  ought  to  have  been 
let  out  and  given  a  show  —  she's  buried  there. 
He  makes  her  do  lots  of  work." 

"  Her  father  ?" 

"  Yes.  She  writes  and  figures  a  good  deal  of 
the  time.  She  keeps  the  grocer's  and  butcher's 
books,  for  one  thing.  Mayme  says  she  knows 
how  to  telegraph— they've  got  their  own  wire 
right  to  the  house.  When  she  wants  dissipation 


89 


she  goes  to  her  '  Friendly.'  And  she  belongs  to 
a  club  over  there  where  they  read  papers  and 
discuss.  She  was  a  good  deal  upset." 

"  Um,"  said  Ogden,  abstractedly.  He  recalled 
the  girl's  appearance  and  her  little  ordeal  of 
having  to  face  a  complete  stranger  at  so  dis 
tressful  a  juncture.  Yet  she  had  borne  herself 
with  dignity  and  composure ;  nor  was  he  able  to 
deny  that  she  had  been  as  perfectly  courteous 
as  her  brief  appearance  permitted.  Now  that 
he  understood,  he  had  less  cause  for  complaint 
against  her  brother,  and  none  at  all  against  her. 

He  dwelt  lingeringly  on  the  idea  of  aa  com 
plete  stranger."  He  did  not  feel  that  it  would 
have  been  infinitely  more  trying  to  face  a  curi 
ous  neighbor.  He  had  begun  to  idealize  the  or 
deal  and  the  victim  of  it. 

"A  penny  for  your  thoughts,"  he  presently 
heard  his  companion  saying.  He  came  out  of  his 
study  and  looked  through  the  stair-rail  at  the 
little  throng  below.  Two  gentlemen  had  just 
come  out  of  the  dining-room. 

"  I  was  wondering  who  they  were,"  he  replied, 
at  a  venture. 

"Who?" 

"  Those  two." 

The  pair  was  followed  by  Walworth,  whose 
pleasure  it  was  to  pour  libations  whenever  the 
gathering  of  two  or  three  together  gave  a  pre 
text  for  that  ceremony.  One  of  the  two  sucked 


90 


in  his  upper  lip  with  due  caution,  and  both  united 
in  a  pretence — decent,  but  slight  and  futile — 
that  the  ladies  knew  nothing  of  these  hospitable 
doings. 

"  The  tall,  brown  one  is  Mr.  Ingles.  Haven't 
you  met  him  here  before  ?" 

She  indicated  a  man  of  forty,  whose  face  was 
shaven  except  for  a  small  pair  of  snuff-colored 
whiskers,  and  whose  mouth  made  a  firm,  straight, 
thin  line. 

"  Ingles  ?     Arthur  J.  ?" 

"  I  don't  know ;  I  guess  so.  He  owns  the 
building— the  Clifton." 

"  He's  no  dude,"  murmured  Ogden  to  himself. 

"  Eh  ?     Who  said  he  was  ?" 

"  Oh,  nobody.     Who  is  the  other  ?" 

"  That's  Mr.  Atwater — Mr.  Ingles's  architect. 
They're  chums ;  were  in  college  together.  Isn't 
he  the  most  fascinating -looking  man  you  ever 
saw?" 

"  By  Jove,  he  is  distinguished,  for  a  fact ! 
Was  he  born — here  ?" 

"  Don't  you  think  it's  lovely  for  a  man  of  his 
age  to  have  gray  hair — gray  that's  almost  white? 
I  shall  do  all  I  can  to  make  my  husband  gray- 
haired  before  he  is  middle-aged  !" 

She  laughed  at  her  own  audacity.  He  turned 
about  and  stared  at  her,  and  she  laughed  more 
heartily  yet. 

"  And  don't  you  like  the  twirl  of  his  mous- 


91 


tache  ?  Or  would  you  have  preferred  him  with 
whiskers  ? — cut  in  a  straight  line  right  across  his 
cheeks,  with  the  corners  near  his  mouth  rounded 
off — but  not  too  formally.  And  do  you  notice 
the  bridge  of  his  nose  and  the  air  it  gives  him  ? 
And  his  eyes — wait  till  he  turns  around  ;  there, 
did  you  ever  see  such  a  hazel?  He  seems  to  have 
everything — youth,  experience,  style,  family;— 
why  did  you  ask  if  he  was  born  here  ?"  she  de 
manded  suddenly. 

"  Did  I  ?  I  must  have  meant — is  he  going  to 
die  here  ?" 

"  Why  not  ?  You  don't  suppose  that  men  of 
talent  are  going  to  leave  Chicago  after  this  ?" 

"  Do  you  expect  to  provide  them  with  ca 
reers  ?" 

"  I  don't  see  why  wTe  shouldn't.  We're  on  the 
crest  of  the  wave,  and  we're  going  higher  yet. 
From  now  on  anybody  who  leaves  us  is  likely 
to  be  sorry  for  it." 

Ogden  looked  back  at  Ingles;  he  stood  in  a 
doorway,  between  Fairchild  and  Jessie's  father. 

"  Is  his  wife  here  ?" 

"  Oh,  he  isn't  married,  I  don't  believe." 

"  Xot  married  ? — Ingles,  I  mean." 

"  Oh !     Yes,  he's  married." 

"  Is  his  wife  here  ?" 

"  Dear,  no ;  you  have  to  speak  weeks  ahead  to 
get  her." 
1   "  He's  the  one,  then,"  Ogden  assured  himself. 


92 


"  Which  one  ?" 

"  Her  husband.     Do  you  know  her  ?" 

"I've  met  her  here."  She  leaned  over  the 
railing.  "What  are  they  all  laughing  about, 
down  there  ?" 

"  Do  you  want  to  go  and  see  ?" 

Mrs.  Floyd  and  her  sister  had  appeared  in  the 
doorway.  Between  them  was  a  little  girl  of  five ; 
she  had  one  hand  in  her  mother's,  and  with  the 
other  she  clutched  a  dilapidated  doll.  The  child 
wore  a  guimpe  and  a  prim  little  frock  with  puffed 
sleeves ;  she  had  long,  smooth  brown  hair  that 
turned  thickly  at  her  shoulders,  and  a  pair  of  big, 
round,  wondering  brown  eyes. 

"  It's  Claudia,"  said  Jessie  Bradley.  "  Yes, 
let's  go  down." 

Atwater  had  placed  himself  before  the  child, 
half  crouching,  half  kneeling.  He  had  the  per 
suasive  and  ingratiating  manner  proper  to  a 
fashionable  architect  whose  clients  were  largely 
women  and  wealthy  ones,  and  he  seemed  willing 
enough  to  bring  his  batteries  to  bear  on  the  tiny 
woman  before  him. 

"  Isn't  it  pretty  late  for  dolly  ?  Oughtn't  she 
to  be  put  to  bed  in  her  own  little  house  ?" 

The  child  looked  at  him  soberly.  "  She  hasn't 
got  any  house." 

"  Hasn't  got  any  house  ?"  He  glanced  at  her 
father.  " i  Oh,  it  is  pitiful — in  a  whole  cityful.' 
But  if  I  were  to  say  that  I  would  make  you 


.,-  , 


93 

one  ?"  he  went  on ;  "  one  with  four  rooms.  And 
windows  in  each  room." 

The  child  pondered,  fixing  a  bashful  look  on 
his  handsome  face. 

"  Would  there  be  stairs  ?" 

"  Yes." 

"And  closets?  Mamma  says  we  never  have 
enough  closet-room." 

"  That's  right,  Claudia,"  said  Ingles,  commend- 
ingly ;  "  score  the  profession." 

"  Yes,  closets,  if  you  insist." 

"  And  glass  in  the  windows  ?" 

"  Yes.  Dear  me,  they  get  more  exacting  with 
us  every  year !" 

"  And  —  and  -  "  she  rolled  her  eyes  around 
the  group,  as  if  wondering  whether  any  impor 
tant  detail  had  been  overlooked — "  gas-fixtures  ? 
Would  there  be  one  in  ivery  room,  with  four 
globes  on  it  ?" 

"  Perhaps." 

"But  don't  charge  the  poor  child  a  full  com 
mission  on  them,"  said  Ingles,  grimly. 

"  Ah  !"  murmured  At  water,  with  a  world  of 
meaning.  "  And  if  I  were  to  promise  to  put  a 
nice  little  red  chimney  on  the  roof — what  would 
you  say  ?" 

The  child  clasped  her  doll  firmly  and  looked 
down  at  the  carpet.  "  I  shouldn't  know  whether 
to  belave  you,"  she  said,  shyly. 

There  was  a  burst  of  laughter.     "You  dear 


94 


little  tot  !"  cried  Mrs.  Fairchild,  gathering  her  up, 
on  no  very  definite  grounds,  for  a  kiss.  Her 
father  laughed  loudest  of  all,  but  her  mother 
contracted  her  eyebrows  in  distress. 

"  That  dreadful  Norah  !"  whimpered  the  poor 
woman.  "  She  must  go." 

"Don't  dismiss  your  ~bonne"  laughed  Atwater, 
thankful  for  the  diversion  ;  "  she'll  produce  a 
beautiful  accent  in  time." 

"  Well,  after  that,"  said  her  father,  "  I  think 
our  little  McG-intums  had  better  retire.  Say 
good-night,  Claudia." 

"  Not  yet,"  said  Ingles.  "  Not  before  she  has 
learned  that  she  may  have  her  doubts  about  a 
contractor,  perhaps,  but  about  an  architect  — 
never.  Remember  that  great  truth.  Good-night, 
my  child.  Won't  you  kiss  me  F 

He  lowered  his  face,  but  Claudia  drew  back. 
"  I  don't  like  whishky,"  she  said,  solemnly. 

"  For  Heaven's  sake,  my  pet,"  cried  Floyd,  "  are 
you  trying  to  start  a  panic?  There's  Norah; 

gO_go." 

"  Good-night,  Claudia,"  called  Atwater  ;  "  we 
won't  forget  your  house.  Upon  my  word,  In 
gles,"  he  went  on  rapidly,  and  with  a  face  still 
slightly  flushed,  "  I  believe  I  shall  have  to  recon 
sider  that  determination  of  mine  I  spoke  to  you 
about  the  other  day." 

"  What's  that  F  asked  Walworth. 

"  To  give  up  sky-scrapers  and  to  do  nothing 


95 


but  colonial  houses  for  the  nobility  and  gentry. 
Sky-scraping  is  bad  enough,  but  the  demands 
of  the  modern  house-builder  are  worse.  Ingles, 
you're  not  as  evil  as  I  said  you  were ;  I'm  sorry 
I  ever  called  you  a  Philistine." 

"  Why  did  you  do  that  ?"  asked  Fairchild, 
amused. 

"  Because,"  answered  Ingles,  "  I  took  two 
weeks  to  consider  whether  I  could  afford  to  let 
the  Clifton  have  four  good  street-fronts." 

"  Didn't  you  say,"  demanded  Atwater,  "  that 
you  wanted  to  put  up  an  architectural  monu 
ment  that  would  be  a  credit  to  the  town  ?  Would 
an  eighteen-story  flank  of  bare  brick  have  been 
a  pleasant  object?  Or,  rather,  is  it? — for  you 
see  that  sort  of  business  all  over  the  city.  Heav 
ens  !"  he  went  on,  "  we're  doing  some  horrible 
things  here,  but  we  are  not  the  ones  who  are  al 
together  to  blame." 

"  Who  says  you  haven't  done  well  with  the 
Clifton?"  demanded  Ann  Wilde.  Most  of  the 
ladies  had  retired  from  these  masculine  topics, 
and  were  huddled  in  a  gossipy  little  group  at 
the  foot  of  the  stairs;  Ann  had  remained  be 
hind,  as  an  owner  of  real  property.  "  That  sys 
tem  of  elevators  is  the  most  magnificent  thing  I 


ever  saw." 


Atwater  groaned.  "  That's  all  a  building  is 
nowadays  —  one  mass  of  pipes,  pulleys,  wires, 
tubes,  shafts,  chutes,  and  .what  not,  running 


96 

through  an  iron  cage  of  from  fourteen  to  twenty 
stages.  Then  the  artist  comes  along  and  is 
asked  to  apply  the  architecture  by  festooning  on 
a  lot  of  tile,  brick,  and  terra-cotta.  And  over 
the  whole  thing  hovers  incessantly  the  demon 
of  Nine-per-cent." 

"  A  slap  at  me,"  said  Ingles. 

"It's  enough  to  make  you  wonder  whether 
Pericles  ever  lived.  I  doubt  if  he  did,"  con 
cluded  Atwater. 

"  Are  you  the  only  sufferer  ?"  asked  his  client. 
"  How  many  of  our  sub-contractors  failed  ?" 

"Two." 

"  How  many  times  were  we  set  on  fire  by  sal 
amanders  ?" 

"  Three." 

"How  many  drunken  night-watchmen  were 
discharged  ?" 

"  Four  or  five." 

"How  much  of  the  tin-work  did  you  con 
demn  ?" 

"  Lots." 

"  How  many  of  the  contractors  suffered  a 
penalty  for  over-time  ?" 

"  Too  many." 

"How  many  times  did  carpenters  wreck  plas 
ter-work  ?" 

"  Fifty." 

"  How  many  times  did  plasterers  ruin  wood 
work?" 


97 


"A  hundred." 

"  How  many  men  were  killed  or  injured  ?" 

"  Thirteen.'' 

"  Thirteen  !"  cried  Ann  Wilde  ;  "  how  horrible  !" 

"  Then  you  don't  encourage  building,"  com 
mented  Bradl-ey  ;  u  and  Mr.  Atwater  wouldn't  en 
courage  young  men  to  go  into  architecture." 

"  As  engineers,  not  as  architects,"  replied  At 
water.  "  Or  shall  I  say  —  as  constructionists  ?" 

"  Good  word,"  murmured  Ingles. 

"Thanks.  I've  got  fifteen  draughtsmen  up 
under  the  roof  of  the  Clifton.  When  a  new  one 
comes,  I  say,  <  My  dear  boy,  go  in  for  mining  or 
dredging,  or  build  bridges,  or  put  up  railway 
sheds,  if  you  must  ;  but  don't  go  on  believing 
that  architecture  nowadays  has  any  great  place 
for  the  artist.  There  won't  be  another  Fair  until 
long  after  you  are  dead  and  gone.'  " 

"  I  think  I've  had  one  of  your  young  men 
with  me  lately,"  Bradley  said.  "  He  told  us  that 
he  had  been  designing  labels  out  at  the  Stock 
Yards,  but  had  been  in  your  office  before  that. 
Art  may  cover  a  wide  range,  you  see,"  he  said, 
laughing. 

"  Yes  ?    What  is  his  name  ?" 

"Brainard,  I  think.  He  was  a  dark  young 
fellow.  He  looked  a  little  dissipated,  it  seemed 
to  me." 

"  That's  the  one,"  said  Atwater.  "  Now  there's 
a  case.  That  boy's  father  has  treated  him  shame- 
7 


98 

fully.  He  might  have  been  made  something  of. 
He  had  a  decided  taste  for  drawing,  and  hardly 
any  other.  I  won't  say  he  had  any  great  abil- 
"ity,  but  that  wouldn't  have  mattered  so  much 
with  training.  However,  he  had  no  training  to 
speak  of,  and  we  couldn't  use  him.  He  hasn't 
got  the  slightest  faculty  for  business;  they 
'  wouldn't  have  made  a  teller  out  of  him  in  twen 
ty  years.  But  that  was  what  they  tried  to  do, 
and  when  it  failed — " 

Fairchild  gave  a  delicate  little  cough. 

"  You  don't  have  to  listen,  Fairchild,"  said 
Atwater.  "  Neither  does  Mr.  Pratt,  unless  he 
chooses." 

Fairchild  withdrew  a  little  from  the  group 
and  stood  with  his  hands  behind  his  back,  while 
the  toe  of  his  boot  moved  the  corner  of  a  rug  to 
and  fro  over  the  polished  floor.  Freddy  Pratt 
held  his  place,  but  moderated  his  show  of  interest. 
Ogden  followed  this  new  recital  with  a  curious 
concern. 

"  His  father  lost  all  patience  with  him,"  At 
water  went  on.  "  Naturally,  such  a  father  would 
with  such  a  son.  He's  altogether  out  of  the  fam 
ily  now.  Is  he  with  you  yet  ?"  he  asked  Bradley. 

"  We  had  him  for  a  while,  but  he  was  pretty 
irregular  and  unreliable — I  never  knew  why  un 
til  now.  He  was  pretty  shabby,  too.  I  guess  he 
was  about  grazing  bottom  most  of  the  time.  I 
never  knew  what  Brainard  he  was." 


99 


"Anyway,  he  seems  to  have  made  a  good 
try,"  said  Ingles.  "  I  suppose  he'll  live  on  post- 
obits,  now,  and  go  to  the  dogs  as  fast  as  possi 
ble." 

"  If  he's  let  go  his  hold  lately,"  declared  At- 
water,  "  it's  on  account  of  his  brother.  Every 
thing's  done  for  him ;  he  is  just  run  right  ahead. 
Do  you  know,"  he  continued,  dropping  his  voice 
and  glancing  aside  towards  Fairchild,  "that 
Brainard  has  just  pushed  that  Burt  of  his  into 
the  vice-presidency  ?  Right  over  everybody.  I 
don't  see  how  Fairchild  can  stand  it.  And  what 
could  be  better  calculated  to  infuriate  the  other 
one — what  is  his  name? — Marcus.  I'd  take  to 
drink  myself." 

Ogden  listened  to  all  this,  and  was  swayed  ac 
cordingly.  His  brief,  fluttering  attempt  to  ideal 
ize  Abbie  Brainard  ended,  and  he  saw  her  only 
in  the  cold,  garish  light  of  crass  reality  that  was 
beating  down  so  fiercely  on  the  rest  of  the  fam 
ily.  He  had  been  meditating  on  calling  upon 
her  at  her  father's  house,  moved  by  the  kind  of 
sympathy  that  anticipates  an  invitation,  or  does 
without  one ;  this  project  he  now  determined  to 
abandon. 


YIII 

McDowELL  had  not  quartered  himself  on  the 
twelfth  floor  of  the  Clifton — as  distinguished 
from  the  eleventh  or  the  thirteenth  or  any  oth 
er — by  a  mere  chance.  He  had  not  been  influ 
enced  by  any  finicky  consideration  of  light,  pros 
pect,  ventilation,  or  nearness  to  the  elevators. 
His  sole  reason  for  selecting  room  number  1262 
was  that  room  number  1263  was  occupied  by 
Arthur  J.  Ingles,  the  owner  of  the  building. 

Ingles  occupied  a  very  small  room,  upon  whose 
door  was  his  name — his  name  and  nothing  more 
— in  very  small  letters.  The  next  door  beyond 
was  lettered  "  Office  of  the  Building,"  and  this 
second  room  had  communication  with  the  first 
by  a  door  between.  ISTone  of  these  three  doors, 
however,  had  as  much  interest  for  McDowell  as 
the  one  between  his  own  office  and  the  private 
office  of  Ingles.  This  door  was  closed,  but  it  was 
McDowell's  dream  and  ambition  to  see  it  open. 
In  his  thoughts  he  constantly  saw  it  standing 
ajar  in  an  intimate  and  friendly  fashion,  while 
he  and  Ingles  and  other  magnates  of  Ingles's  ilk 
circulated  through  it  freely  and  all  did  business 
together. 


101 


Up  to  the  present  time  this  door  had  never 
been  opened,  nor  had  McDowell  ever  had  access 
to  the  other  suite  except  by  the  farther  door, 
through  which  tenants  passed  to  request  repairs 
or  to  pay  their  monthly  rent. 

Ingles  was  enough  of  a  lawyer  to  be  a  real- 
estate  man.  and  enough  of  a  real-estate  man  to 
need  to  be  a  lawyer.  He  supervised  the  draw 
ing  of  his  own  deeds  and  leases,  and  seldom  took 
counsel  in  matters  between  landlord  and  tenant. 
As  a  landlord,  he  had  found  it  advantageous  to 
divest  himself  of  his  soul  by  making  the  Clifton 
into  a  stock  company;  he  himself  held  all  the 
shares  but  five.  He  had  an  extraordinary  facul 
ty  for  keeping  himself  out  of  the  papers ;  but 
this  did  not  prevent  McDowell  from  knowing 
that  he  was  constantly  engaged  in  enterprises  of 
the  first  magnitude,  and  he  felt  that  association 
with  this  great  capitalist  would  be  immensely  to 
his  own  advantage. 

But  he  had  accomplished  only  one  step  that 
might  be  reckoned  an  advance  :  he  had  under 
taken  the  financial  arrangements  connected  with 
St.  Asaph's  choir.  This  was  a  large,  well-trained 
body,  and  was  provided  with  all  the  expensive 
paraphernalia  of  a  "  high  "  service.  It  included 
four  or  five  tenors  and  basses  who  commanded 
rather  good  salaries,  as  well  as  an  expert  organ 
ist  and  an  experienced  choir-master  who  com 
manded  larger  ones.  The  management  had  been 


102 


by  committee,  and  several  of  the  pillars  of  the 
church,  Ingles  among  them,  had  learned  the  dif 
ficulty  of  mediating  between  music,  money,  and 
ritualism.  A  member  of  a  previous  committee 
had  delighted  in  translating  and  adapting  Latin 
hymns  for  Christmas  and  Easter,  and  in  putting 
his  hands  into  his  pockets  now  and  then  to 
make  good  a  small  deficit  in  the  budget.  Ingles 
and  his  compeers  were  ready  enough  to  put  their 
hands  into  their  pockets,  but  they  were  glad,  one 
and  all,  to  escape  the  details  of  administration. 

It  was  here  that  McDowell  stepped  forward ; 
he  cynically  acknowledged  that  religion  must  be 
made  to  play  into  the  hands  of  business,  and  he 
justified  himself  to  himself  by  many  good  argu 
ments.  The  details  of  the  new  dispensation  were 
arranged  in  a  down-town  office.  McDowell  had 
tried  to  contrive  that  that  office  should  be  In 
gles' s  own  ;  but  the  meeting  was  held,  after  all, 
in  another  tall  tower  a  block  or  two  down  the 
street,  and  Ingles  himself  was  not  present  more 
than  ten  minutes.  McDowell  regretted  this ;  he 
felt  very  well  disposed  towards  Ingles.  He  would 
have  done  almost  anything  for  him — for  a  com 
mission. 

But  McDowell  did  not  push  this  choir  matter 
to  the  neglect  of  his  own  proper  business.  He 
was  engaged  at  about  this  time  with  a  new  sub 
division  out  beyond  the  South  Parks.  He  had 
bought  up  a  ten-acre  tract,  which  he  himself  ac- 


103 


knowledged  to  be  rather  low-lying,  and  which 
his  rivals,  with  an  unusual  disregard  of  the  court 
esies  of  the  profession,  did  not  hesitate  to  call 
an  out-and-out  swamp.  He  had  mended  matters 
somewhat  by  means  of  a  dam  and  a  sluice,  which 
drained  off  a  part  of  his  moisture  on  to  grounds 
lying  lower  still — other  men's  grounds ;  and  on 
the  driest  and  most  accessible  corner  of  his  do 
main  he  had  placed  a  portable  one-story  frame 
shanty  which  had  already  done  duty  on  other 
subdivisions,  and  alongside  of  it  stood  a  tall  flag 
pole  which  flaunted  a  banner  with  his  own  name 
and  number  on  it.  This  tract,  by  the  way,  had 
absorbed  some  moderate  portion  of  Ann  Wilde's 
hoarded  savings. 

A  week  of  rainy  weather  now  and  then  would 
lay  a  complete  embargo  on  McDowell's  opera 
tions  in  this  quarter.  His  plank  walks  would 
float  off  in  sections ;  the  trees  along  his  avenues 
would  sag  deeply  into  the  slush  and  would  sway 
sidewise,  in  spite  of  their  networks  of  rusty  wire ; 
and  the  cellars  of  the  three  or  four  unfinished 
houses  that  he  had  artfully  scattered  through 
this  promising  tract  would  show  odds  and  ends 
of  carpenters'  refuse  floating  around  in  muddy 
water  a  foot  deep.  It  was  an  appalling  specta 
cle  to  one  who  realized  the  narrow  margins  upon 
which  many  of  these  operations  were  conducted, 
or  who  failed  to  keep  in  mind  the  depths  that 
human  folly  and  credulity  may  sound. 


104 


"  Oh,  it's  all  right  enough,"  McDowell  would 
say.  "  It's  going  to  dry  up  before  long." 

Occasionally  it  did  dry  up  and  stay  so  for  sev 
eral  weeks.  Then,  on  bright  Sunday  afternoons, 
folly  and  credulity,  in  the  shape  of  young  mar 
ried  couples  who  knew  nothing  about  real  es 
tate,  but  who  vaguely  understood  that  it  was 
a  "  good  investment,"  would  come  out  and  would 
go  over  the  ground — or  try  to.  They  were  wel 
comed  with  a  cynical  effrontery  by  the  young 
fellow  whom  McDowell  paid  fifty  dollars  a 
month  to  hold  the  office  there.  He  had  an  in 
sinuating  manner,  and  frequently  sold  a  lot  with 
the  open  effect  of  perpetrating  a  good  joke. 

McDowell  sometimes  joked  about  his  custom 
ers,  but  never  about  his  lands.  He  shed  upon 
them  the  transfiguring  light  of  the  imagination, 
which  is  so  useful  and  necessary  in  the  environs 
of  Chicago.  Land  generally — that  is,  subdivided 
and  recorded  land  —  he  regarded  as  a  serious 
thing,  if  not  indeed  as  a  high  and  holy  thing, 
and  his  view  of  his  own  landed  possessions — 
mortgaged  though  they  might  be,  and  so  partly 
unpaid  for — was  not  only  serious  but  idealistic. 
He  was  able  to  ignore  the  pools  whose  rising 
and  falling  befouled  the  supports  of  his  side 
walks  with  a  green  slime ;  and  the  tufts  of  reeds 
and  rushes  which  appeared  here  and  there  spread 
themselves  out  before  his  gaze  in  the  similitude 
of  a  turfy  lawn.  He  was  a  poet — as  every  real- 
estate  man  should  be. 


105 

We  of  Chicago  are  sometimes  made  to  bear 
the  reproach  that  the  conditions  of  our  local  life 
draw  us  towards  the  sordid  and  the  materialistic. 
Now,  the  most  vital  and  typical  of  our  human 
products  is  the  real-estate  agent :  is  he  common 
ly  found  tied  down  by  earth-bound  prose  ? 

"  You  fellows,"  said  Floyd  to  McDowell, 
during  one  of  Sister  Ann's  sessions,  "  are  the 
greatest  lot  I  ever  struck."  He  spoke  in  a  half- 
quizzical,  half-admiring  way,  and  showed  some 
effort  to  handle  the  language  with  the  Western 
ease  and  freedom  of  those  to  the  manner  born. 
"  Do  you  know,  when  I  had  been  here  three  or 
four  months  some  fellows  took  me  with  them  to 
the  banquet  of  the  Real  Estate  Board.  Well,  it 
was  an  eye-opener ;  I  never  saw  anything  like  it. 
It  was  Chicago  —  all  Chicago.  Heavens !  how 
the  town  was  hymned  and  celebrated !  It  was 
personified — 

"  That's  right,"  said  McDowell. 

"  And  glorified—" 

"  Of  course." 

"  And  deified— " 

"Why  not?" 

"Why  not,  indeed?"  cried  Ann  Wilde.  "7 
haven't  been  around  much  yet,  but  you  strike 
me  as  the  most  imaginative  lot  of  people  I  ever 
saw." 

"  Whenever  Chicago  is  involved,"  amended 
Walworth. 


106 


«  Sure." 

"  How  you  idealize  it !"  cried  Ann,  enthusias 
tically.  "  How  you—" 

"  It  needs  to  be  idealized — and  badly,"  said 
her  sister. 

But  McDowell's  interests  in  the  southern  sub 
urbs  as  well  as  at  St.  Asaph's  were  soon  set  aside 
by  another  matter;  domestic  interests  claimed 
his  attention. 

His  father-in-law  had  now  passed  some  two 
or  three  months  in  Chicago.  He  had  entered 
the  city  without  any  conception  of  its  magni 
tude,  and  he  had  remained  in  it  without  rising 
to  any  conception  of  its  metropolitan  complexi 
ties.  He  had  made  a  change  that  was  too  great 
and  too  late.  He  made  but  an  ineffectual  at 
tempt  to  connect  and  identify  himself  with  the 
great  rush  of  life  going  on  all  about  him.  He 
came  down  town  almost  every  day  to  spend  an 
hour  or  more  in  McDowell's  office,  where  he 
took  a 'certain  satisfaction  in  following  out  the 
intricacies  of  the  local  topography  by  passing  a 
thin,  blue-veined  hand  over  McDowell's  maps 
and  his  canvas- bound  books  of  plats.  McDowell 
treated  him  with  considerable  patience  and  with 
as  much  respect  as  was  due  to  a  man  who  had 
no  great  experience  in  real  estate  and  little  apti 
tude  for  learning.  One  day  old  Mr.  Ogden,  who 
apprehended  the  lake  winds  little  better  than 
the  local  "  lay  of  the  land,"  took  a  slight  cold  in 


107 


returning  home  from  the  office ;  two  days  after 
pneumonia  developed,  and  within  a  week  he 
died. 

George  undertook  the  charge  of  such  arrange 
ments  as  recognized  the  old  New-Englander  as 
a  dead  man  merely,  and  McDowell  subsequently 
took  charge  of  those  which  recognized  him  as  a 
dead  property-owner.  First,  the  funeral ;  after 
wards,  the  Probate  Court. 

A  funeral  is  more  disagreeable  than  a  wed 
ding,  chiefly  because  its  multifarious  details  make 
their  demands  with  but  a  scanty  notice  in  ad 
vance.  All  of  these  details  George  was  now 
called  upon  to  face  and  to  dispose  of. 

He  squared  his  jaw,  set  his  eyes,  put  a  cold, 
heavy  paving-stone  in  place  of  his  heart,  and 
met  these  details  one  by  one.  It  was  a  man's 
privilege. 

Brower  went  with  him  to  the  undertaker's, 
and  mediated  between  grief  and  rapacity. 

"  Be  careful  here,"  Brower  said  to  him  in  an 
undertone.  They  were  in  a  room  where  sample 
caskets  stood  on  end  against  opposite  walls  and 
were  let  down  one  by  one  for  the  inspection  of 
purchasers. 

"  They  always  show  the  most  expensive  ones 
first.  Don't  look  at  these.  You  don't  need  to 
pay  a  hundred  and  fifty  dollars.  You  can  se 
lect  a  suitable  one  for  eighty  or  ninety — per 
fectly  good  and  no  loss  of  respect." 


108 


"  How  about  the  outside  box  ?"  asked  the  man 
in  due  course.  He  was  in  his  shirt-sleeves  and 
wore  a  high  silk  hat. 

"  Here,"  whispered  Brower,  "  you'll  have  to 
take  the  most  expensive.  It's  chestnut — fifteen 
dollars.  Nothing  else  but  plain  pine  for  a  dol 
lar  fifty.  Shameful,  isn't  it  ?" 

Brower  arranged  for  the  handles  and  the 
plates.  He  also  met  the  family  at  the  railway- 
station  next  day,  and  saw  the  casket  put  on 
board  the  east-bound  express. 

He  and  George  were  walking  slowly  up  and 
down  the  platform  alongside  the  train  when  a 
man  in  blue  overalls  leaned  out  of  the  door  of 
the  baggage-car  and  called  to  them.  He  held  a 
paper  in  his  hand. 

"  This  ain't  quite  regular,"  he  said.  "  Our  road 
is  pretty  strict.  The  air-tight  casket  is  all  right 
for  inter-state  travel,  but  the  doctor  hasn't  signed 
this  certificate." 

George  turned  on  Brower  with  a  look  of  an 
guish. 

"  Here !"  cried  Brower,  stretching  up  his  hand. 
"How  forgetful  of  me!  I'll  sign  it  now.  Go 
along,  Ogden." 

The  man  hesitated.     "  Not  contagious  ?" 

"  Certainly  not.  Hand  it  down.  Got  a  pencil  ? 
There!  Here's  a  two.  Take  extra  care." 

The  dead  man's  -son  paid  for  the  music  and 
flowers,  his  wife  and  daughter  folded  away  his 


109 


clothes,  and  his  son-in-law  undertook  to  see  his 
estate  through  the  courts. 

"  I  don't  believe  you'd  better  pay  the  doctors 
and  undertaker  yet,"  he  counselled.  "  Let  them 
file  their  claims  with  the  Probate  people.  It 
doesn't  cost  but  a  dollar,  and  if  you  pay  without, 
you  might  be  liable  over  again  —  you  are  on 
other  claims.  I'll  keep  a  general  eye  on  matters, 
of  course,  but  questions  will  be  coming  up  all 
the  time.  I  don't  know  but  what  we'd  better 
have  a  lawyer  first  as  last.  The  Probate  ar 
rangements  are  different  now  from  what  they 
used  to  be — more  expensive,  for  one  thing.  Now 
there's  Freeze  &  Freeze — they're  as  good  as  any, 
and  they're  right  there  in  the  Clifton,  George, 
only  five  floors  above  you." 

"Have  we  got  to  go  into  this  thing  right 
away  ?"  asked  George,  as  if  in  physical  pain. 

"  Oh,  no.  Wait  a  few  weeks — wait  a  month, 
if  you  like." 

"  Yes,  we'll  wait,"  he  sighed. 

McDowell  made  no  opposition  to  his  wife's 
suggestion  that  her  mother  now  come  and  live 
with  them.    He  had  not  anticipated  his  mother- 
in-law  as  a  member  of  his  own  household ;  but 
he  liked  her  well  enough,  and  he  generally  treat 
ed  her  with  a  dry  and  sapless  sort  of  kindness. 
Besides,  he  looked   on  domestic   arrangements', 
as   a  mere   incident   in   business   life,  anyway.' 
George,  who  for  some  time  had  been  anticipat- 


110 


ing  a  home  with  his  parents,  could  not  find  an 
equivalent  in  a  home  with  the  McDowells,  and 
he  remained  with  Brower  on  Rush  Street. 

There  was  no  will ;  the  recasting  and  consol 
idation  of  the  small  estate  had  required  too 
much  time  and  attention  to  leave  much  for  any 
thought  of  its  redistribution.  Mrs.  Ogden  went 
into  court  at  the  proper  time  and  qualified  as 
administratrix.  She  was  a  figure-head,  of  course. 
She  signed  various  documents  at  George's  in 
stance  ;  George  himself  was  guided  by  Mc 
Dowell,  principally ;  and  McDowell  got  a  point, 
now  and  then,  from  the  attorneys.  However, 
the  legal  labors  of  Freeze  &  Freeze  on  the  Og 
den  estate  were  chiefly  clerical;  this  did  not 
prevent  them  from  charging  like  chancellors 
and  chief -justices. 

These  charges  and  others  were  paid  by  Mc 
Dowell,  who  began  informally  by  giving  checks 
on  his  own  private  account.  He  came  to  receive, 
too,  most  of  the  rents  and  other  payments, 
which  were  more  conveniently  made  to  him  in 
his  own  office  than  to  George  in  the  office  of 
the  bank.  And  since  he  paid  the  estate  charges 
out  of  his  own  private  account,  it  seemed  natu 
ral  enough  that  his  own  account  (which  was  with 
the  Underground)  should  receive  the  sums  com 
ing  in.  This  arrangement  came  about  gradu 
ally,  without  receiving  any  formal  acquiescence ; 
but  George  appeared  satisfied  with  the  business 


Ill 


capacity  of  his  sister's  husband;  while  his  mother 
was  an  inmate  of  her  son-in-law's  house,  where 
inquiry  and  explanation  were  easily  enough 
made. 

These  details,  once  in  hand,  appeared  to  give 
little  hinderance  to  the  course  of  McDowell's 
regular  business.  His  acquaintances  in  his  own 
line  noticed  its  increasing  spread,  and  agreed 
among  themselves  that  he  was  flying  a  little  high 
for  a  man  of  his  limited  resources.  He  had  more 
work  for  the  surveyors  and  sign-painters,  and  he 
presently  added  a  clerk  or  so  to  his  office  force. 

Various  small  claims  were  filed  in  the  Probate 
Court  and  were  allowed.  "  I  think,''  said  George 
to  McDowell,  "  that  we'll  use  Kastner's  rent  for 
them.  To-day  is  the  third;  he  has  been  in,  I  sup 
pose  ?" 

"  He'll  have  to  be  punched  up,"  replied  Mc 
Dowell.  "  It  doesn't  do  to  give  them  any  lee 
way." 

"  He  has  always  been  prompt  on  the  first," 
said  George,  somewhat  annoyed. 

The  next  morning  he  entered  the  paying-tell 
er's  pen  for  a  moment,  as  occasionally  happened. 
His  eye  chanced  to  alight  on  the  balance  sheet 
that  ran  from  L  to  Z. 

McAvoy,  Louis  M 81.93 

.McCloud,  Peters  &  Co 1187.25 

McDowell,  E.  H 0 


112 


" How's  this,  Jo  F  asked  Ogden.  "What's  the 
matter  with  McDowell  ?" 

"  Pulled  out  yesterday,"  responded  the  payer, 
briefly. 


IX 

MCDOWELL'S  defection  from  the  Underground 
was  presently  followed  by  an  addition  to  its 
working  force.  One  morning,  a  month  or  so 
later,  Ogden,  in  an  interval  of  leisure,  glanced 
across  to  the  window  before  which  Burton  Brain- 
ard  had  railed  in  his  desk,  and  saw  a  young 
woman  within  the  enclosure.  She  sat  there 
alone,  before  a  desk  of  the  peculiar  kind  that 
has  been  contrived  for  the  typewriter,  and  her 
effect  at  the  moment  was  that  of  leisure  finally 
and  elegantly  achieved. 

He  was  at  once  struck  by  her  peculiar  facial 
expression  ;  she  had  one  eye  open  and  the  other 
shut.  All  at  once  she  effected  an  instantaneous 
change  which  closed  the  open  eye  and  opened 
the  closed  one.  Then  she  opened  both  and  gave 
out  a  smile  of  recognition,  surprise,  and  pleasure, 
which  he  now  perceived  to  be  the  work  of  the 
features  of  Cornelia  McNabb. 

"  Here  we  are !"  she  seemed  to  say. 

She  had  followed  Burt's  elevation  to  the 
vice-presidency,  along  with  the  new  desk  and 
the  handsome  rail-work  enclosing  it.  Burt's 
concerns,  despite  his  rise  in  rank,  were  now,  as 

8 


114 


heretofore,  largely  outside  the  bank  proper ;  fie 
did  something  in  stocks  now  and  then,  and  he 
kept  the  run  of  things  on  the  Board  of  Trade. 
But  he  was  like  his  father  in  looking  upon  the 
bank  as  a  personal  and  family  matter — a  point 
of  view  which  the  action  of  the  body  of  stock 
holders  somewhat  justified :  as  a  general  thing 
they  made  up  a  chorus  that  huddled  in  the 
wings — several  of  them  declining  to  come  "on" 
even  for  the  election  that  advanced  Brainard,  Jr., 
to  the  second  place.  So  he  saw  no  very  good 
reason  why  the  bank  generally  should  not  foot 
the  bill  for  his  own  clerk-hire. 

"  Why  can't  you  use  the  man  we've  got  here 
already?"  his  father  had  asked  him,  however. 
"  Ain't  one  enough  ?" 

"  No.  Somebody  else  has  always  got  him.  If 
I  could  have  one  for  myself  just  for  an  hour  or 
so,  it  would  be  a  great  help." 

"  Why  don't  you  get  one  of  those  girls  that 
circulate  around  upstairs?  I  hear  there's  one 
or  two  of  'em." 

"  I  believe  I  will."  And  thus  Cornelia  MoNabb 
came  in  for  a  brief  daily  attachment  to  the  Un 
derground. 

She  sat  in  her  place  quite  unoccupied  for  an 
hour  or  so,  looking  about  inquiringly,  fidgeting 
a  little,  and  watching  the  clock.  Ogden  glanced 
over  in  her  direction  once  or  twice.  He  saw 
that  she  had  contrived  to  express  her  rise  by 


115 


several  subtile  alterations  in  her  dress,  and  tnat 
she  had  succeeded  in  enveloping  herself  in  a 
promising  atmosphere  of  gentility.  She,  in  her 
turn,  kept  an  eye  on  him  and  contrived  to  time 
her  own  luncheon  along  with  his.  She  thrust 
her  hat-pin  into  place  just  as  he  buttoned  on  his 
cuffs,  and  she  drew  a  black-dotted  veil  across  the 
tip  of  her  nose  just  as  he  was  reaching  up  for  his 
hat. 

They  sauntered  out  separately,  but  came  to 
gether  in  the  hallway. 

"  Do  I  look  nice,  or  don't  I  2"  she  asked  him, 
as  she  passed  one  of  her  gloves  over  the  smooth 
surface  of  the  massive  marble  balustrade.  "  You 
needn't  think  the  Pewaukee  girls  are  jays; 
they're  too  near  Lakeside  and  Waukesha  for 
that." 

"You  do,  indeed.  But  where  are  the  chains 
and  rings?" 

"  Fiddle  !  I  hope  I  know  better  than  that, 
now." 

The  elevators  were  sliding  up  and  down  be 
hind  their  gilded  grilles  with  great  rapidity,  and 
hundreds  of  hungry  helpers  were  stepping  out 
of  them  in  search  of  brief  refreshment.  Some 
of  these  stopped  in  the  basement  vestibule,  and 
our  young  people,  looking  over  the  balustrade, 
saw  them  buying  packages  of  cigarettes  or  the 
noon  papers.  There  came  to  them,  too,  the  voice 
of  the  man  wrho  stood  at  the  foot  of  the  elevator 


116 


,  hafts  and  who  regulated  the  movements  of  the 
various  cabs  by  calling  out  their  numbers  with 
a  laconic  yawp.  He  wore  a  blue  uniform  with 
gilt  buttons  and  he  had  a  gold  band  on  his  cap. 
He  was  as  important  as  Ingles  himself — perhaps 
more  so. 

"  I  believe  I'll  go  up  to  the  restaurant  to-day," 
said  Cornelia,  with  a  precious  little  intonation. 
Her  mincing  tone  intimated  a  variety  of  things 
— altered  conditions  among  them. 

"  I  go  up  there  occasionally  myself,"  said  Og- 
den.  u  You  have  entertained  me  several  times 
downstairs,  and  you  ought  to  give  me  my  chance 
now,  don't  you  think  ?" 

"  Quite  happy,  I'm  sure,"  she  murmured 
demurely. 

"  Up  !"  called  Ogden,  and  up  they  went. 

"  Well,"  said  Cornelia,  a  few  minutes  later, 
taking  off  her  gloves  with  a  self-conscious  grace, 
and  pushing  aside  her  tumbler  so  as  to  find  a 
place  to  lay  them,  "  I  can't  say  I've  been  over 
worked  this  morning.  I  haven't  seen  my  new 
man  at  all." 

"  He's  out  a  good  deal." 

"  But  the  old  one  was  on  deck." 

"In  what  way?" 

"  Oh,  he  put  me  through  a  regular  drill.  Made 
quite  a  number  of  remarks.  I  shouldn't  care  to 
take  him  down.  May  have  to,  though,  if  he 
gets  too  bossy.  Eh  1 — oh,  well,  I  don't  know 


117 

that  I  care  for  so  very  much,  thank  you.  What 
are  you  going  to  have?  Chicken  -  soup  ? — all 
right.  Yes,  chicken-soup,  John^J 

She  leaned  back  in  her  chair  with  a  genteel 
grace,  and  looked  out  of  the  window  down  on 
the  snow-piled  roofs  below. 

"  Do  you  know,  I  used  to  think  I  was  a  pret 
ty  smart  girl,  but  I  begin  to  believe  I'm  a  good 
deal  of  a  dummy,  after  all.  That  man  has  been 
in  the  building  all  this  time,  and  I  have  just 
found  it  out." 

Ogden's  eye  involuntarily  followed  the  waiter. 

"  Not  that  black  man — nix.  But  how  could 
I  be  expected  to  spot  his  name  among  all  the 
'steen  hundred  on  that  bulletin  by  the  door?  I 
did  see  it  there  this  morning,  though — just  by 
accident." 

"Whose?" 

"  Oh,  Ingies's.  Arthur  J.  Ingles.  Think  of 
his  being  in  this  very  building  all  this  time!" 
She  put  the  rim  of  her  tumbler  up  under  the 
edge  of  her  veil. 

"  In  it  ?"  repeated  Ogden.     "  He  owns  it." 

"He  does?  Great  Scott!"  she  choked  and 
spluttered,  setting  her  glass  down  suddenly. 
"  Well,  I'll  be  switched  !" 

She  gave  another  gulp.  "  I  suppose  his  father 
willed  it  to  him." 

"  No ;  he  put  it  up  for  himself ;  I  heard  him 
say  so." 


118 


"  And  you  know  him  ?"  A  new  light  shone  in 
her  brimming  eyes. 

«  Yes." 

"  Well,"  she  declared  with  emphasis,  "  now  I 
see  my  way.  He's  got  to  have  me  do  shorthand 
for  him,  and  then  I  shall  see — her." 

"  Ah !" 

"Yes.  Can't  you  tell  Mr.  High-and-mighty 
that  you  know  a  respectable  girl  who  is  trying 
to  make  her  own  living?"  She  ran  her  fingers 
over  the  edge  of  one  of  her  cuffs,  which  was 
slightly  frayed.  "  You  see  how  poor  I  am." 

George  laughed.  "  The  laundries  are  pretty 
rough,  for  a  fact." 

"  How  mean  of  you !"  she  exclaimed,  and 
laughed  too. 

She  thrust  back  her  soup. 

"  I  don't  want  it.  I  don't  want  anything. 
I  can't  eat  a  mouthful.  Then  I  was  wrong 
about  his  being  a  society  dude  ?" 

«  Completely." 

"  And  how  is  she  ?  S'posing  I've  made  a  mis 
take  about  her,  too  ?" 

"  I  don't  know,  I'm  sure.  I've  never  seen 
her." 

"  You're  telling  me  a  fib." 

"No,  truly,  I  never  have.  I  don't  believe 
there's  any  such  person.  I  think  she's  some 
body  that  the  papers  have  just  made  up.  How 
many  people  have  you  found  to  work  for  ?" 


119 


"  Oh,  three  or  four.  But  time  for  more. 
Rhyme,  ain't  it  ?  I'm  trying  for  the  Massachu 
setts  Brass,  but  I'd  rather  get  Ingles.  She  gave 
a  dance  at  Kinsley's  night  before  last." 

"  How  many  words  can  you  do  ?" 

"  About  ninety — enough  for  business ;  of  course 
I  couldn't  manage  courts  or  banquets  or  ser 
mons.  I  expect  she  comes  down  to  his  office 
for  a  check  every  now  and  then.  Why  don't  she 
ever  have  her  picture  in  the  Sunday  papers  ?" 

"  O  Lord !  I  hope  they're  above  that  /" 

"  What's  the  objection  ?  I'd  have  mine  there 
quicker  'n  scat  if  I  could.  I  will  some  time- 
bet  you.  And  not  in  any  office  togs  either." 

"  But  don't  dream  of  rivalry.  She  isn't  real ; 
she's  only  a  beautiful  myth.  What  will  you 
take  next — roast  beef  ?" 

"  I  don't  mind ;  yes.  When  I'm  alone  I 
usually  skip  right  from  soup  to  pie  —  or  pud 
ding.  But  I  guess  I  will  take  something  a  lit 
tle  solider  this  time ;  nothing  makes  me  tireder 
than  sitting  still  and  fidgeting."  She  tapped 
her  toes  on  the  mosaic  pavement,  and  gave  a 
hitch  and  a  pat  to  the  dimity  curtain  alongside 
her.  "  I  squirmed  around  for  an  hour,  with  a 
whole  bookful  of  other  people's  notes  that  I 
might  have  been  writing  out.  What  sort  of  a 
young  fellow  is  he  ?" 

"  He  has  his  own  way." 

"  Only  child,  I  suppose  ?" 


120 


"  Only  son  ?" 

"  No — yes — I  don't  know.  How  do  you  like 
your  work  ?" 

"  Middling.  I'm  terrible  enterprising,  but  I 
guess  I  was  never  meant  for  a  drudge.  Say, 
what  does  a  patroness  really  do  ?" 

"  Oh,  nothing  much ;  she  just  has  her  name 
on  the  list.  Sometimes  they  don't  even  go." 

"  I  notice  that  your  Mrs.  Floyd  is  beginning 
to  be  one ;  I've  seen  her  in  the  papers  two  or 
three  times." 

"  She  doesn't  like  it,  though ;  sometimes  names 
get  put  on  just  to  fill  up.  '  My  dear  Mrs.  Floyd, 
we  thought  you  wouldn't  mind  ;  you  don't,  do 
you  ?'  they  say.  '  But  my  name  in  the  papers,' 
she  objects.  *  You  are  too  sensitive,'  they  reply. 
4  You've  had  your  name  in  the  papers  at  home,' 
her  husband  reminds  her.  £  Yes,'  she  answers, 
'  but — here  .!'  She  hates  the  town." 

"  AVell,  if  I  was  a  patroness  I  guess  I'd  have 
some  say — no  figure-head  for  me.  I  wouldn't 
be  put  on,  either  ;  I'd  put  the  others  on." 

"  I  see  you  were  cut  out  for  a  'society'  career." 

"  I  guess  you've  about  struck  it.  I  went  to 
a  dance  a  week  ago  to-night — Periclean  Pleas 
ure  Party." 

"Like  it!" 

"  'Twa'n't  much.  And  I  was  invited  to  a 
firemen's  ball — such  impudence !" 


121 


"  Eight— don't  cheapen  yourself." 

"  I  guess  I  understand  that." 

Meanwhile  a  nooning  of  a  different  character 
was  going  on  in  the  directors'  room  of  the  Un 
derground.  This  is  not  to  be  taken  as  indi 
cating  that  the  green -baize  plane  of  the  long 
centre-table  was  littered  with  reports  and  mem 
oranda,  and  that  the  high-backed,  leather-seated 
chairs  were  filled  with  the  solid  figures  of  a 
dozen  solid  men.  No  ;  the  aspect  of  the  room 
was  that  of  Sunday-like  disoccupation,  and  the 
only  people  in  it  were  an  appealing  young 
woman  and  a  stubborn  old  man. 

"  Let  her  come  in,  father  ;  please  do." 

"  Take  care,  Abbie.  You  know  what  I  think 
of  you,  but  you  make  a  mistake  when  you  try 
this." 

Abbie  Brainard  passed  her  handkerchief  across 
her  tearful  face.  Her  father  stood  before  her 
with  his  legs  spread  wide  and  his  feet  firmly 
planted  ;  he  had  his  hands  thrust  deeply  into 
his  trousers  pockets.  His  jaw  was  set,  and  his 
shaggy  brows  were  drawn  down  over  eyes  that 
glared  fiercely  at  nothing. 

"  Then  meet  her  out  in  the  hall  somewhere, 
just  for  a  minute."  She  laid  her  hand  trem 
blingly  upon  the  old  man's  arm.  He  moved, 
as  if  to  shake  it  off. 

"  Then  just  walk  by  outside ;  she  can  see  you 
from  the  cab." 


122 


He  turned  his  eyes  upon  her,  half  in  expostula 
tion  and  half  in  threat.  "  Abbie !" 

"  Then,  father,  just  step  here  to  the  window ; 
she'll  see  you  and  know  it's  all  right.  Come." 
She  caught  hold  of  a  fold  of  his  sleeve.  "  You 
won't  keep  her  waiting  out  there  such  a  cold  day 
as  this  ?" 

Brainard  moved  his  feet,  but  he  turned  his 
back  on  the  window  and  fixed  his  eye  on  the 
fireplace.  His  daughter's  light  touch  was  quite 
powerless  on  his  huge  bulk. 

"  Father,  you  know  Burt  says — " 

"  Abbie,"  he  interrupted  sharply,  "  don't  you 
say  a  word  to  set  me  against  Burt.  I  won't  hear 
it.  Don't  drag  him  in,  or  you'll  be  sorry  for  it." 

"But,  father,  don't  you  understand?  He 
struck  her ;  there's  a  mark  on  her  face  now." 

Brainard's  great  frame  shook,  but  he  made  no 
other  sign.  This  quiet  she  took  as  a  favorable 
symptom.  She  would  have  done  better  in  per 
ceiving  that  he  was  between  two  contending 
forces  so  nearly  equal  as  to  hold  him  almost 
in  equilibrium.  The  wretch  had  struck  his 
daughter — a  brutal,  hateful  thing  as  regarded 
his  daughter  or  any  daughter  or  any  other 
woman ;  but  his  daughter  had  defied  him,  over 
ridden  him,  and  the  man  whom  she  had  chosen 
for  a  master  was  now  the  instrument  of  her  pun 
ishment.  The  accounts  appeared  to  balance. 
However,  figures  do  lie,  and  his  own  agitation 


123 


indicated  that  the  x  of  human  emotion  had  not 
been  completely  eliminated  from  his  problem. 

He  cleared  his  throat.  "She  has  made  her 
bed,  Abbie,"  he  said  in  a  husky  tone,  "  and  now 
she  must  lie  on  it." 

"  No,  father ;  you  must  hear  what  Burt  says. 
He  has  had  to  go  up  there  and— 

"  Burt  ?  Is  that  where  he  has  been  this  morn 
ing?  Has  he  turned  against  me  too?  Good 
God !  what  have  I  done  to  deserve  such  treat 
ment  as  this  ?  First  it's  Mark,  with  his  drawing 
and  his  trying  to  play  the  fiddle ;  and  then  it's 
this  pen-pusher  that  puts  on  those  things  Sun 
days  and  marches  around  singing  songs ;  and  now 
it's  Burt,  who's  had  every  chance  to  make  a  good 
business-man  of  himself,  and  everything  done  for 
him.  It's  too  bad ;  it's  too  almighty  bad." 

Abbie  steadied  herself  against  the  corner  of 
the  table.  Her  breast  heaved  with  fearf ulness ; 
she  had  never  before  openly  protested  to  her  fa 
ther  against  himself. 

"Why  haven't  you  done  anything  for  the 
others?  Why  didn't  you  give  Mark  an  educa 
tion  ? — the  kind,  I  mean,  that  would  have  helped 
him,  and  the  only  kind.  Why  haven't  you  taken 
this  Mr. — Mayme's  hus — this  man  and  made  the 
best  of  it,  and  found  something  for  him  to  do  ? 
— he  can  work  in  an  office.  Oh,  father,"  she 
moaned,  with  a  softening  note  of  deprecation, 
"  you  have  made  it  pretty  hard  for  all  of  us." 


124 


"  Abbie,"  he  gasped,  "  are  you  turning  against 
me  too?  Abbie,  I've  always  thought  so  much 
of  you,  and  I've  clone  well  by  you.  But  I  want 
you  to  go  away — I  won't  see  her.  I  won't.  She 
must  go  away,  and  you  too." 

He  caught  her  by  the  arm  and  tried  to  move 
her  towards  the  door — gently,  as  if  she  might  go 
of  her  own  accord. 

Ogden,  on  coming  in  from  lunch,  found  him 
self  intercepted  by  Freddy  Pratt.  This  youth 
had  a  few  moments'  leisure,  and  he  assailed 
Ogden  between  the  wardrobe  and  the  wash- 
stand. 

"  I  went  over  to  see  the  Yiberts  again ;  last 
night,"  he  communicated.  "Poor  Mayme  —  I 
wasn't  going  back  on  her,  if  others  did.  She 
was  sitting  there  all  alone  in  the  dark.  I  guess 
she  had  been  crying.  Anyway,  when  I  lit  the 
gas  her  eyes  looked  red.  She  wouldn't  say 
much— 

"  Good  plan." 

"  And  after  he  came  in  she  wouldn't  say  hard 
ly  anything  at  all.  Slow  work  talking  to  him! 
He  wasn't  drunk  exactly,  but  he  had  been  drink 
ing;  didn't  need  a  light  to  tell  that.  I  wasn't 
doing  anything  at  all,  and  all  of  a  sudden  he 
blurted  out,  '  I  say,  you  young  fellow  you,  what 
do  you  mean  by  coming  here  and  destroying  the 
peace  of  a  man's  family  ¥  You  can  bet  I  was 
taken  back.  Then  he  got  up  and  came  towards 


125 


me — he  looked  big,  too !  '  You  get  out  of  here ' 
—that's  what  he  said." 

"And  did  you?" 

"  Oh,  yes,  I  got  out,"  responded  Freddy  Pratt, 
with  a  meek  complacency. 

"  You  surprise  me.     You  showed  sense." 

Freddy  looked  at  him  doubtfully.  "  I  heard 
this  morning  that  he  had  just  lost  his  place  with 
those  insurance  people,"  he  resumed  cautiously. 
"  That  was  what  was  the  matter,  I  guess." 

"  Possibly,"  said  George,  who  had  heard  from 
Brower  that  something  of  the  kind  was  likely  to 
occur.  The  fellow's  work  had  been  done  indif 
ferently  of  late,  and  he  was  far  from  being  worth 
the  increased  salary  he  had  asked  for. 

As  Ogden  passed  up  to  the  other  end  of  the 
office  Brainard  appeared  in  the  doorway  of  the 
directors'  room  and  beckoned  to  him.  His  face 
was  pale  and  disturbed ;  the  veins  in  the  end  of 
his  nose  showed  redly  ;  his  eyes  burned  with  an 
appealing  fierceness. 

"  Ogden,"  he  said,  in  a  loud,  hoarse  whisper, 
"  where  is  that  type- writer  girl  ?  Tell  her  to 
bring  some  water  here  as  quick  as  she  can." 

"  She  isn't  here,  sir ;  she  has  gone  back  up 
stairs." 

"  Then  you  get  some  yourself.  Here ;  take 
this  tumbler.  Be  quick,  and  don't  make  any 
fuss." 

Ogden  hastened  to  the  wash-stand  near  which 


126 

Freddy  Pratt  had  detained  him.  Eetnrning 
again,  he  saw  through  the  half -open  door  that 
Abbie  Brainard  was  lying  back  in  one  of  the  big 
chairs  with  her  face  pallid  and  her  eyes  closed. 

Her  father  dipped  two  of  his  great,  clumsy 
fingers  into  the  glass  and  made  an  awkward  at 
tempt  to  sprinkle  her  face.  "  My  poor  girl  has 
fainted,"  he  said. 

The  girl's  eyes  half  opened ;  she  seemed  to  see 
Ogden  standing  just  outside. 

She  clutched  both  arms  of  the  chair  and  raised 
herself  half  up.  Her  bosom  heaved ;  her  mouth 
was  drawn  tensely. 

"Fainted?"  she  tried  to  say;  "not  at  all!" 
She  gasped  once  or  twice  and  rose  to  her  feet. 
"  I  never  fainted  in  my  life,"  she  said  grandly ; 
"  I  never  should  think  of  doing  such  a  thing !" 

She  reeled ;  her  eyes  closed.  George  rushed 
forward  to  catch  her.  Her  hand  dropped  numb 
on  his  arm,  and  her  head  fell  heavily  on  his 
shoulder. 


OGDEN  and  his  mother  were  now  beginning  to 
have  frequent  conferences  with  regard  to  the 
management  of  the  property  and  to  McDowell's  v 
connection  with  the  matter.  Perhaps  the  word 
"  conference  "  puts,  however,  too  set  and  formal 
a  stamp  on  the  brief,  hap-hazard  interchanges  of 
ideas  that  took  place,  as  chance  permitted,  with 
in  McDowell's  own  house — a  few  words  after  a 
Sunday  dinner  or  at  the  front  door  late  at  night. 
And  besides  being  handicapped  as  to  occasion, 
they  were  further  hampered  by  McDowell's  new 
relation  to  them  and  by  their  own  presence  un 
der  his  roof.  Besides,  Mrs.  Ogden,  with  a  mul 
titude  of  small  experiences,  had  no  ability  for 
grasping  things  in  a  large  and  general  way; 
while  George,  with  a  broader  and  more  compre 
hensive  outlook,  was  embarrassed  by  a  lack  of 
experience  in  the  actual  details  of  business  trans 
actions.  Added  to  this,  he  was  a  new-comer, 
under  all  a  new-comer's  disadvantages ;  he  hard 
ly  knew  where  to  turn  for  the  proper  agents, 
legal  or  financial,  that  might  have  been  em 
ployed;  while  many  of  the  agencies  —  courts, 
for  instance  —  were  different  in  procedure  and 


128 


even  in  name  from  anything  he  had  known 
East. 

"  All  the  same,  though,"  he  said  to  his  mother, 
"things  ought  to  be  in  different  shape  for  you. 
I'm  bound  hand  and  foot  in  that  bank — no  time 
or  thought  for  anything  outside.  I  don't  know 
but  what  you'd  better  put  everything  with  some 
good  real-estate  firm,  and  let  them  look  after  re 
pairs  and  collections  and  taxes." 

His  mother  fixed  a  pair  of  anxious  eyes  upon 
him,  and  the  wrinkles  of  perplexity  appeared  on 
her  forehead. 

"  Eugene  is  real-estate." 

"  Or  those  lawyers,"  he  went  on.  "  Anyway, 
you  ought  to  have  an  account  as  administratrix 
with  some  bank.  I  believe  I'll  open  one  to-mor 
row.  Something  has  got  to  be  done  to  make 
things  quicker  and  clearer." 

He  presently  took  upon  himself  the  delicate 
task  of  intimating  to  McDowell  that  a  simpler 
and  more  regular  way  of  doing  things  was  de 
sired. 

He  went  up  to  McDowell's  office  in  the  latter 
part  of  the  afternoon.  As  he  entered,  a  tall, 
dark  man  was  standing  in  the  middle  of  the 
room.  There  was  a  sinister  look  in  his  eyes  and 
a  contemptuously  sarcastic  smile  on  his  heavy 
red  lips.  He  gave  a  last  fold  to  a  small  piece  of 
paper  that  he  held  in  his  hands  and  thrust  it  into 
his  vest  pocket.  It  was  Yibert. 


129 


"It's  pretty  near  four  now,"  he  was  saying 
to  McDowell,  "  so  I  can't  try  again  to-day ;  but 
I  expect  to  find  this  all  right  after  ten  to-mor 


row  morning." 


He  gave  his  hand  a  hardy  flip  across  one  side 
of  his  dark  moustache  and  passed  out.  McDow 
ell  looked  after  him  sourly.  "  Damn  the  brute  !" 
he  muttered. 

As  Yibert's  words  implied,  he  had  been  in 
McDowell's  office  once  before  on  the  same  day. 
His  salary  at  St.  Asaph's  now  meant  more  to 
him  than  it  had  meant  a  month  ago,  and  he  had 
called  with  reference  to  it  and  to  the  delay  in 
its  payment.  Hitherto,  the  financial  arrange 
ments  of  the  church  had  gone  on  with  the  same 
precision  as  its  anthems  and  its  processionals. 
In  the  present  condition  of  things  delay  to  Yi- 
bert  was  more  than  a  surprise,  more  than  an 
embarrassment ;  it  was  an  exasperation. 

'"  I  don't  sing  for  glory,"  he  had  declared  with 
an  offensive  brusqueness.  "  It's  the  here  and  not 
the  hereafter  that  I'm  busy  with." 

McDowell  looked  at  him  uneasily.  "  I'm  going 
to  fix  up  all  the  salaries  next  week  in  one  batch. 
I  don't  see  why  any  particular  man  should  be 
favored." 

"  Favored !"  repeated  Yibert,  with  a  loud  inso 
lence.  "  I  should  say  not.  I  don't  feel  favored 
in  running  my  legs  off  for  money  three  weeks 
overdue.  "We  can't  live  on  air.  We  have  bills 
9 


130 


to  pay.  "We  ain't  singing  for  the  pleasure  of 
it." 

McDowell  contracted  his  eyes  to  a  critical  nar 
rowness.  "  You  may  not  be  singing  much  longer 
for  anything  else,  either." 

"That's  another  matter;  it  isn't  you  that  put 
the  choir  together." 

McDowell  tapped  his  fingers  on  the  yellow 
varnish  of  his  desk.  "  I  don't  know  about  that. 
From  what  I  hear,  you're  not  making  the  sort  of 
record  for  yourself  that's  useful  in  a  church." 

"  My  private  life  is  nobody's  business.  I  sing ; 
I'm  worth  the  money." 

"That  may  work  on  the  stage;  it  won't  work 
quite  so  close  to  the  pulpit.  Come,  now ;  I  know 
a  little  something  of  your  daily  doings.  Plenty 
of  men  sing  who  don't  hang  around  race-tracks 
and  loaf  in  pool-rooms.  And,  from  what  I  hear, 
you're  helping  that  young  Brainard  along  at  a 
good  gait,  too.  You'd  better  wait — along  with 
the  others." 

"  Waiting  be  hanged  !  Pm  here  for  money— 
money  that's  mine.  If  I  can't  work  it  with  the 
man  who  pays  out  the  loaves  and  fishes,  I'll  try 
one  of  the  men  that  contribute  them,  in  the  first 
place."  He  tossed  his  head  insultingly  towards 
the  door  that  led  to  Ingles's  office. 

McDowell's  elbow  rested  on  the  edge  of  his 
desk  (his  thumb  on  the  tip  of  his  ear  and  his 
middle  finger  rubbing  his  farther  eyebrow)  as 


131 


he  looked  out  steadily  on  Yibert  from  under  his 
hand.  "Joseph,"  he  called  to  his  clerk,  "bring 
me  that  check-book." 

The  man  opened  a  lower  drawer  and  brought 
out  a  book  whose  covers  enclosed  a  number  of 
stubs  and  three  or  four  blank  checks. 

McDowell  wrote  and  passed  the  check  to  Yi 
bert,  who  went  out  with  no  further  words  on 
either  side. 

McDowell  did  some  figuring  and  saw  some 
people,  and  somewhat  later  Yibert  returned. 
He  threw  his  check  on  McDowell's  desk  con 
temptuously.  "  That's  no  good." 

"  How's  that  ?" 

"  No  account  with  'em." 

"  No  ac — oh,  I  see.  We've  changed  banks, 
and  I  forgot  to  change  the  name  in  the  check." 
He  picked  up  a  ruler  and  drew  the  red-ink  bot 
tle  a  little  nearer.  "  I'll  fix  it.  Sorry  to  have 
troubled  you.  We  want  to  look  out  for  this, 
Joseph." 

Yibert  withdrew,  speaking  the  words  that  Og- 
den  had  heard  on  his  entrance — words  that  would 
have  been  the  reverse  of  assuring  if  he  had  fully 
understood  them.  "  Bad  egg,"  said  McDowell 
to  him,  wagging  his  head  in  the  direction  of  the 
just  closed  door. 

George  looked  at  him  studiously.  He  ap 
peared  to  be  in  a  state  of  extreme  nervous  irrita 
tion.  His  wiry  moustache  moved  up  and  down 


132 


stiffly  as  he  felt  about  with  his  teeth  for  the  in 
ner  membrane  of  his  lips.  His  long,  lean  fingers 
were  interlaced,  and  a  clicking  sound  came  from 
his  snapping  his  finger-nails  together.  It  was 
clearly  no  occasion  for  more  than  a  partial  state 
ment  of  Ogden's  matter,  and  this  was  the  most 
that  he  permitted  himself. 

But  McDowell  was  in  the  sensitive  state  of 
mind  when  one  word  does  the  work  of  three, 
and  in  the  irritable  state  of  mind  when  talk  is 
such  a  relief  that  three  words  evoke  thirty  in 
reply.  He  met  George's  brief  and  modest  sug 
gestions  with  a  hitching  of  his  shoulders,  and  an 
swered  them  in  a  harsh  and  strident  tone. 

"  The  first  thing  in  doing  business,"  he  said, 
ais  to  have  an  office  to  do  it  in."  He  looked 
about  his  own — his  desks,  his  cashier's  window, 
his  letter -press.  "And  the  second  is  to  know 
how  to  do  it."  He  looked  out  of  the  window  in 
a  wholly  impersonal  way,  but  his  words  had  a 
more  personal  slant  than  he  would  have  given 
them  at  almost  any  other  time.  "  Gad  knows 
I've  got  enough  to  do  already,  but  Kittie's  af 
fairs  are  mine.  She  has  equal  interests  with 
the  others,  and  she  seems  to  feel  that  I  am  able 
and  willing  to  look  after  them." 

He  spoke  with  some  show  of  reason,  and  George 
was  obliged  so  to  concede. 

"  There's  taxes,  for  one  thing.  Or,  take  spe 
cial  assessments  alone ;  they're  almost  a  business 


133 


by  themselves.  Say  you've  got  ten  acres  or  so 
just  beyond  the  limits.  Some  fine  day  it's  six 
hundred  dollars  or  more  for  half  a  mile  of  side 
walk — a  sidewalk  that  won't  be  walked  on  by 
seven  people  a  week.  What's  the  reason  ?  Oh, 
some  one  of  those  township  politicians  or  other 
has  got  a  friend  that's  a  carpenter.  Now,  who's 
going  to  tackle  the  boards  and  stave  off  such 
things  ?" 

George  looked  at  him  silently. 

"  There's  tax-sales — I  guess  you  never  went  to 
one  of  them.  You'd  strike  a  bloodthirsty  crew 
if  you  did.  Supposing  you've  got  a  mortgage, 
and  the  mortgager  don't  come  to  time  with 
his  taxes  ?  You've  got  to  buy  'em  up  to  protect 
yourself.  And  you've  got  to  get  there  first. 
Last  year  I  fought  this  point  for  a  week  with 
one  of  those  tax-sharks.  And  so  it  goes.  Real 
estate  is  no  kindergarten  business,  I  can  tell 
you." 

The  truth  of  this  view  was  becoming  more  and 
more  apparent  to  Ogden.  He  withdrew,  after 
some  further  parleyings,  in  a  confused  and  in 
conclusive  state  of  mind — well  convinced,  how 
ever,  of  McDowell's  abilities  and  more  fully  con 
scious  of  McDowell's  position  as  the  husband  of 
his  father's  daughter.  Never  did  the  town  of 
his  adoption  seem  less,  indeed,  like  a  kindergar 
ten  than  when  he  took  his  way  northward  to 
dinner,  or  when,  later  in  the  early  evening,  he 


134 


made  his  way  over  to  the  West  Side  to  call  at 
the  Brainards.  The  thousands  of  acres  of  ram- 
'  shackle  that  made  up  the  bulk  of  the  city,  and 
the  tens  of  thousands  of  raw  and  ugly  and  half- 
t)uilt  prairie  that  composed  its  environs,  seemed 
together  to  constitute  a  great  checker-board  over 
whose  squares  of  "  section  "  and  "  township  " 
keenness  and  rapacity  played  their  daring  and 
wary  game.  And  through  the  middle  of  the 
board  ran  a  line,  a  hinge,  a  crack — the  same  line 
that  loomed  up  in  all  those  various  deeds  and 
abstracts  of  his  with  the  portentousness  and  un- 
escapability  of  the  equator  —  the  "line  of  the 
third  principal  meridian." 

The  Brainard  house  reared  itself  in  the  same 
frivolous  ugliness  that  we  have  already  viewed ; 
but  an  excess  of  light  came  through  the  front 
parlor  windows,  and  Ogden  was  prepared  to  find 
that  at  least  four  of  the  eight  burners  in  the  big 
chandelier  were  lighted.  This  turned  out  to  be 
the  case ;  it  was  as  great  a  tribute  as  the  family 
ordinarily  paid  to  society.  The  family  he  found 
represented  by  Brainard,  his  wife,  and  his  elder 
daughter ;  society  was  present  in  the  shape  of  a 
young  couple  who  were  called  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Val 
entine. 

The  elder  daughter  received  him  with  a  quiet 
and  simple  cordiality.  He  could  not  help  look 
ing  about  furtively  for  the  possible  presence  of 
the  younger.  He  had  not  remained  ignorant  of 


135 


her  half -hour  wait  in  a  cab  outside  the  bank; 
but  he  might  have  surmised  the  inflexibility  of 
her  father's  will.  The  old  man  had  refused  to 
see  her  or  to  let  her  see  him ;  the  most  that  he 
would  yield  was  a  species  of  non-committal  com 
munication  through  Burt. 

Mrs.  Brainard  presented  herself  to  Ogden  as 
a  peculiarly  faded  and  ineffective  person  ;  it  was 
easy  enough  to  grant  her  an  abysmal  incapac 
ity.  Her  husband,  in  fact,  had  fallen  upon  her, 
crushed  her,  absorbed  her — as  a  heavy  blotting- 
pad  falls  on  a  page  of  light  and  delicate  writing. 
Except  for  one  thing  she  had  no  aim,  no  occu 
pation,  no  diversion — beyond  her  ills  and  reme 
dies.  This  was  a  penchant  for  chess.  To  those 
who  object  that  chess  is  an  intellectual  game, 
one  may  simply  put  the  question  :  have  you  ever 
seen  it  taken  up  by  an  elderly,  invalided  female 
who  has  rested  content  with  a  mere  learning  of 
the  moves  ?  It  was  thus  with  Mrs.  Brainard ; 
she  played  a  good  many  games  with  herself 
every  day,  and  they  realty  soothed  and  rested 
her. 

On  the  social  board,  however,  she  had  hardly 
learned  the  first  "  opening,"  and  the  entertain 
ment  of  the  brilliant  young  couple  now  in  her 
house  fell  almost  altogether  on  Abbie  ;  for  the 
girl's  mother  sank  back  into  a  passive  silence, 
while  her  father  toured  through  the  rooms  oc 
casionally,  and  threw  out  remarks,  more  or  less 


d  propos,  in  a  gruff  and  abrupt  fashion  peculiar 
to  himself. 

His  manner  with  young  men  had  simply  closed 
the  house  to  them.  To  him  it  was  an  inexplica 
ble  and  harassing  thing  that  a  young  fellow  of 
twenty-five  should  not  possess  the  capacity,  ex 
perience,  and  accumulations  of  a  man  of  thirty- 
five  or  forty.  He  regarded  every  intruder  in 
the  light  of  a  potential  son-in-law,  and  no  more 
potential  than  undesirable.  Most  of  these  call 
ers  would  gulp  down  once,  with  such  smile  as 
they  could  master,  the  old  man's  abrupt  ways 
and  disconcerting  comments;  then  they  got  out 
of  the  house  in  good  order  and  never  came  back. 
However,  at  the  present  juncture  he  did  not 
appear  to  resent  Ogden's  appearance — notwith 
standing  the  young  man's  share  in  the  episode 
at  the  bank ;  perhaps  he  looked  upon  him  as  a 
serviceable  prop  in  another  bad  quarter  of  an 
hour. 

"  Yes,  Mr.  Brainard,"  Mrs.  Valentine  was  say 
ing,  as  George  entered,  "  it's  just  as  I  have  been 
telling  Abbie ;  you  ought  to  move  over  on  the 
North  Side,  too." 

Brainard  happened  to  be  passing  through  the 
room  ;  it  had  occurred  to  him  that  he  might 
turn  down  one  of  the  side-burners  in  the  back 
parlor. 

"  Um,  no,"  he  said,  in  an  off-hand  way ;  "  too 
near  the  lake :  fog ;  damp ;  rheumatism." 


137 


"  And  pneumonia  too,  perhaps,"  his  wife  sug 
gested  feebly. 

"  I'll  risk  it !"  cried  Mrs.  Valentine,  vivacious 
ly.  She  had  an  expansive  and  affluent  effect ; 
she  appeared  mettlesome,  decisive,  confident.  "  It 
seemed  to  me  that,  so  long  as  I  was  going  to 
build,  I  might  as  well  make  a  complete  sweep 
— an  out-and-out  break.  I've  always  had  a  fancy 
for  that  part  of  town.  So  I  sent  Adrian  around 
to  the  different  offices- 
She  threw  a  look  of  passing  reference  towards 
her  husband,  who  made  a  little  bow  in  return. 

"  — and  I  had  the  good  luck  to  get  a  lot  on 
Bellevue  Place — one  of  the  last  left,  and  only  a 
block  from  the  Lake  Shore  drive.  Then  I  went 
to  Mr.  Atwater,  and  he  has  made  my  house  a 
perfect  little  dream !  I  thought  it  best  to  have 
him  to  dinner  once  or  twice,  and  I'm  glad  I  did 
— he's  been  so  interested  all  through.  There 
hasn't  been  the  least  hitch  to  speak  of,  and  I 
expect  to  get  in  within  a  fortnight.  This,"  she 
went  on,  turning  to  Ogden  with  an  undiminished 
vivacity,  "is  really  my  P.  P.  C." 

Ogden  glanced  at  the  husband  of  the  lady 
whose  use  of  the  first  person  singular  was  so 
frank  and  continuous.  He  Avas  a  young  man 
with  a  pleasant  and  amiable  face,  and  that  face 
was  set  in  a  meek  little  smile,  from  whose  forced 
lines  the  element  of  deception  was  most  pitifully 
lacking. 


138 


"  Yes,  Abbie  dear,"  Mrs.  Valentine  went  on, 
"  I'm  afraid  it's  good-by — or  nearly  the  same 
thing."  She  took  the  girl's  hand  within  her  own 
and  gave  it  repeated  pats  in  a  rather  careless 
and  self-absorbed  way.  "  I  shall  try  to  see  you 
often,  of  course;  but  it  will  be  so  far.  How 
nice  it  would  be  if  you  could  only  come  up  there 
and  settle  down  right  next  door  to  me." 

Ogden  sighed  unconsciously.  He  had  fancied 
the  first  rays  of  social  illumination  as  falling 
upon  this  benighted  family  ;  but  it  was  only  the 
last  faint  glow  of  a  speeding  twilight,  after  all. 

Abbie  withdrew  her  hand  with  a  quiet  dig 
nity  ;  she  seemed  to  put  but  a  moderate  value 
on4hese  protestations. 

"  I  believe  we  are  satisfied  where  we  are,  Fan 
ny,"  she  said  in  a  low  and  even  tone.  "We 
have  always  lived  here ;  we  feel  more  at  home 
in  this  house  than  we  could  anywhere  else.  All 
our — all  our— friends  are  near  us" — a  desolate 
little  blush  came  in  here — "and  then  there's 
the  church  and  everything.  I've  heard  my  sis— 
I'm  told  that  the  North  Side  is  very  pleasant  on 
some  accounts,  but  I  don't  think  we  are  likely 
ever  to  change." 

"  Change  !"  called  her  father,  suddenly.  "  I 
wouldn't  live  anywhere  else  if  you  paid  me  to. 
"What's  better  than  this  ?" 

"  So  attached,"  murmured  her  mother,  vaguely. 

Mrs.  Valentine  continued  for  some  time  fur- 


. 


139 


ther  to  flutter  her  hands,  her  clothing,  and  her 
conversation,  but  she  was  very  slow  about  get 
ting  up  and  fluttering  away.  She  was  a  neigh 
bor,  and  her  return  home  was  a  matter  of  three 
minutes.  Ogden's  return  was  a  matter  of  nearly 
an  hour,  and  he  left  first.  He  carried  away  the 
discontented  feeling  of  a  young  man  whose  aim 
in  the  direction  of  a  young  woman  is  frustrated 
by  the  presence  of  uncongenial  elders  and  irrel 
evant  outsiders.  He  had  been  quite  certain  of 
his  ability  to  meet  Abbie  Brainard  after  the 
bank  episode  without  any  particular  embarrass 
ment  or  restraint ;  certainly  he  had  come  to  view 
with  more  interest  a  girl  whose  hand  had  lain  in 
his  and  whose  head  had  rested  on  his  shoulder. 
There  had  been  no  embarrassment  in  her  greet 
ing  of  him;  her  manner  had  been  as  straight 
forward  and  sensible  as  it  always  was.  •  But 
never  mind  ;  he  should  try  again ;  he  was  only 
too  certain  of  soon  finding  her  alone. 

He  took  his  hour  through  the  clamor  and  the 
slime  of  the  public  ways.  He  escaped  from 
these  by  his  talismanic  night-key,  and  stumbled 
up  thoughtfully  to  his  room. 

There  was  a  light  burning  in  it,  and  the  fire 
place  showed  the  faint  red  of  dying  coals.  A 
valise,  open  and  half  unpacked,  stood  in  the  mid 
dle  of  the  floor,  and  sitting  up  in  bed  was  Brow- 
er,  busy  with  the  last  volume  of  "  Monte  Cristo." 
They  now  occupied  a  large  front  room  togeth- 


140 


er,  which  Ogden  had  to  himself  a  good  half  of 
the  time. 

"Back,  are  you?"  said  George.  "When  did 
you  get  in  ?" 

"  About  seven." 

"  How's  Missouri  ?" 

"  Weather  good ;  eating  bad." 

"  Eeading  all  this  time  ?" 

"  Went  to  theatre." 

"  What  did  you  see  ?" 

"  '  Crackling  of  Thorns.'  " 

"  Any  good  ?" 

"  Not  much ;  one  pretty  girl.  Where  have 
you  been  ?" 

"  West  Side ;  Brainard's." 

"Anybody  there?" 

"  The  old  people.  And  some  friends— Valen 
tines." 

"  Valentine  ?  I  used  to  know  a  Valentine — 
nice,  quiet  fellow,  light  complexion.  His  name 
was  Alpheus — no,  Adrian." 

"  That's  the  one." 

"  Poor  fellow !  he  deserved  a  better  fate." 

"  What's  the  matter  with  him  ?" 

"  His  wife  owns  him." 

George  smiled.  Brower  hitched  himself  up 
on  his  pillow  and  put  his  finger  into  the  book 
to  keep  the  place.  "  He  was  a  first-rate  fellow 
— good  all  through  and  kind  of  capable;  that 
is,  he  was  worth  a  salary  of  eighteen  hundred  a 


141 


year — or  two  thousand.  He  married  a  girl  with 
two  thousand  a  month.  No  head  book-keeper, 
no  cashier,  no  secretary  could  she  let  him  be  af 
ter  that ;  no,  Johnny  must  be  his  own  master — 
except  as  regarded  her.  To-day  he  sort  o'  hangs 
on  the  outskirts  of  business,  and  picks  up  a  lit 
tle  here  and  a  little  there  —  he  has  desk-room 
somewhere  in  the  Clifton,  I  believe.  He  does 
the  best  he  can  to  preserve  his  self-respect,  but 
I  don't  see  how  he  can  pay  the  bills  and  the 
house-rent  too." 

"  House-rent?  They're  building — I  mean,  she 
is." 

"  Yaugh !"  cried  Brower,  with  deep  meaning. 

"Atwater's  doing  the  house  for  them  —  for 
her." 

"  Atwater?"  Brower  gave  a  second  hitch  to 
the  pillow,  and  threw  the  book  to  the  foot  of 
the  bed.  "  He's  another.  He's  had  a  trip  in 
the  same  boat." 

"  Why,  he  isn't  married." 

"I  guess  he  is  —  just  about  as  hard  as  any 
man  ever  was.  But  he  has  fought  through  gal 
lantly — I'll  say  that  for  him." 

"  What's  his  story  f ' 

"  Begins  in  the  same  way.  She  was  rich,  too, 
and  a  high-flyer.  He  had  education  and  family 
and  his  profession — and  no  money.  He  strug 
gled  up  for  ten  years,  and  now — now  he  stands 
on  his  own  legs ;  his  wife  has  her  own  money 


142 

for  her  clothes  and  amusements.  He  saw  he  had 
got  to  strike  society,  and  he  struck  it — hard ; 
he  costs  like  smoke.  But  he  snatched  victory 
from  defeat.  It  was  a  great  act.  Speaking  of 
acts — who  do  you  think  I  saw  there  in  a  stage- 
box  to-night  2"  . 

"  Who  ?" 

"  Burt  Brainard.  Just  kick  that  valise  out  of 
the  way  if  you  want  to." 

"  All  alone  ?" 

"  Nope.  Girl  with  him.  One  of  the  Clifton 
type-writers — the  one  who  used  to  be  down  in 
the  lunch-room." 

"NealieMcNabb?" 

"  U'm  h'm." 


XI 

MCDOWELL'S  second  check  to  Yibert  proved 
good  on  the  opening  of  business  next  morning. 
It  was  paid  in  the  usual  mechanical  and  imper 
sonal  fashion  that  gives  no  possible  clue  to  the 
amount  of  the  balance  remaining  after;  but 
paid  it  was,  all  the  same,  and  Yibert's  antici 
pated  opportunity  for  further  invective — an  op 
portunity  which  he  considered  quite  possible, 
and  would  have  been  by  no  means  sorry  to  em 
brace — came  to  naught. 

McDowell's  friendly  intimation  that  St.  Asaph's 
might  presently  dispense  with  Vibert's  services 
was  soon  found  to  have  as  solid  a  backing  as  his 
signature.  Within  less  than  a  fortnight  Vibert 
was  dismissed,  though  on  grounds  not  altogether 
the  same  as  those  that  McDowell  had  figured  upon. 
If  Yibert,  after  descending  to  the  ground 
floor,  had  immediately  crossed  the  great  court 
of  the  Clifton  instead  of  lingering  there  for  a 
moment,  the  outcome  might  have  been  quite 
different.  But  he  paused  in  the  midst  of  its 
mosaicked  expanse  to  pull  out  the  check  from 
his  pocket  and  to  take  another  look  at  it.  He 
projected  his  vision  so  far  into  the  future  as  the 


144 


next  forenoon,  and  saw  the  check  again  rejected 
—this  time  by  the  teller  of  the  Highflyers' — by 
reason  of  "  no  account,"  or  perhaps  by  reason  of 
"  no  funds."  He  dramatized  a  precipitous  visit 
to  McDowell's  office,  and  improvised  the  scene 
of  denunciation  and  vigorous  action  that  was  to 
accompany  it. 

"  It  had  better  be  good  this  time,"  he  mut 
tered,  with  his  eyes  on  the  pavement.  "I'll 
strangle  him  if  it  ain't." 

He  tossed  up  his  head  and  sent  a  fierce  and 
frowning  glance  through  one  of  the  great  plates 
of  French  glass  that  shut  in  the  court.  His  eye 
darted  forward  on  its  own  level,  but  ifc  saw  noth 
ing  save  McDowell  in  his  office,  ten  or  twelve 
floors  above. 

Most  of  the  panes  that  enclosed  this  central 
space  were  of  great  height  and  breadth,  and 
were  lettered  with  the  silvered  styles  and  titles 
of  various  railroad  and  mining  companies ;  oth 
ers,  smaller,  gave  light  and  some  ventilation  to 
a  few  booth-like  shops ;  a  few  others,  immova 
ble  half-lights,  admitted  a  little  daylight  and  no 
air  at  all  to  certain  closet-like  crannies  that  had 
a  squeezed  and  crowded  role  in  the  Clifton's 
general  economy.  One  of  these  last  looked  out 
from  under  a  kind  of  secondary  stairway;  it 
lighted  the  scullery  of  the  Acme  Lunch  Eoom, 
and  it  commanded  a  view  of  that  side  of  the 
court  on  which  Yibert  was  standing. 


145 


Yibert's  heel  gave  a  vicious  dig  into  the  mo 
saic  pavement  and  made  a  quick  and  rasping 
turn  towards  the  exit ;  he  crossed  the  court 
with  a  heavy  yet  rapid  stride,  and  passed  out 
into  the  street.  He  was  quite  unconscious  of 
observation,  but  he  had  been  seen. 

Through  the  half-pane  under  the  stairway  a 
young  woman  had  noted  his  presence  and  wit 
nessed  his  departure.  She  was  a  thin,  faded 
creature,  in  the  forlorn  garments  of  an  undis- 
guisable  poverty.  All  but  the  faintest  traces  of 
good  looks  seemed  to  have  been  taken  from  her 
by  a  long  experience  with  illness  and  suffering. 
She  stood  close  against  the  pane.  Her  thin  fin 
gers,  red  and  chapped,  showed,  as  they  pressed 
against  the  glass,  the  crinkled  puffiness  that 
comes  from  long  immersion  in  hot  water,  and 
she  stared  through  v/ith  a  look  of  mingled  fear, 
entreaty,  and  agony.  At  the  glance  which  Yi 
bert's  indignation  over  McDowell's  trickery  sent 
in  her  direction,  she  started  and  cowered  like 
one  who  had  encountered  that  glance  before ; 
and  when  he  turned  to  go  she  recovered  herself, 
and  flung  her  bosom  and  her  hands  against  the 
pane  as  if  bent  upon  breaking  through  and  fol 
lowing  him. 

A  moment  later  she  appeared  in  the  court ; 
she  had  put  on  a  shabby  hat  and  a  flimsy,  faded 
shawl.    She  crossed  over  hastily,  and  approached 
the  head  of  the  elevator  squad. 
10- 


146 


"  The  tall,  dark  man  who  just  went  out — you 
saw  him?"  she  inquired  hurriedly.  She  spoke  in 
two  quick  expulsions  of  the  breath,  and  seemed 
left  without  a  third. 

"  Una  ?"  The  man  opposed  his  gold  band  and 
gilt  buttons  to  her  forlorn  and  bedraggled  shab- 
biness.  His  brief  inquiry,  made  without  open 
ing  his  lips,  had  the  true  official  indifference ;  but 
it  caused  his  questioner  to  feel  some  of  the  dis 
advantage  that  comes  to  a  young  woman  from  a 
public  and  impulsive  inquiry  after  a  young  man. 

"  You  saw  him  standing  over  there  ;  he  had  a 
paper  in  his  hand.  Tell  me,  does  he  work  in  this 
building?"  She  was  panting  and  all  a-tremble, 
but  she  found  breath  for  these  words  and  will  to 
use  it. 

"  Yes,  I  saw  him,"  the  man  answered,  with  the 
slow  reluctance  of  his  kind  to  be  interested  in  in 
dividuals  as  individuals.  "  Used  to  work  here,  I 
believe.  Haven't  seen  much  of  him  lately." 

"  Where  can  I  find  him  ?" 

The  man  turned  towards  the  elevators ;  one 
had  just  that  minute  come  down.  u  Chicago  !" 
its  youthful  conductor  had  called  with  an  airy 
drawl. 

"  Pete,"  said  his  superior ;  "  a  tall,  dark  man 
who's  been  standing  around  here."  He  threw 
his  thumb  over  towards  the  girl,  to  indicate  that 
the  inquiry  was  hers.  "  Had  on  a  soft  brown 
hat." 


147 


"  Yes,  I  seen  him,"  said  the  boy.  "  Used  to 
be  in  one  of  them  insurance  offices,  didn't  he? 
Yibert — was  that  his  name  ?" 

«vi—  r 

"  Yibert,"  said  the  man,  impatiently.  "  Come, 
come,  don't  block  the  way  —  sev-en!"  he  cried, 
in  his  professional  tone,  and  the  boy  at  once 
slammed  his  door  to  and  started  roof  wards. 

The  man  retired  into  himself  with  a  resump 
tion  of  his  air  of  idle  dignity.  The  girl,  at  a 
short  remove,  stood  looking  at  him  with  an  anx 
ious  face.  She  made  a  timid  attempt  to  ap 
proach  him  again  and  presently  stole  away. 

Yibert  was  followed  down  from  McDowell's 
office,  in  the  course  of  half  an  hour,  by  Ogden. 
McDowell's  dissertation  on  tax  matters,  with  its 
pointed  presentation  of  extreme  cases,  had  left 
him,  as  we  have  seen,  in  a  state  more  or  less 
stirred  up ;  and  it  had  occurred  to  him  that  if  he 
were  to  stop  on  the  way  down  he  might  find  some 
legal  sedative  in  the  office  of  Freeze  &  Freeze. 
But  the  hour  was  now  rather  late;  Freeze  & 
Freeze  were  being  locked  up  by  the  last  of  their 
junior  clerks;  and  Ogden  was  left  to  ramble 
through  the  corridors  in  a  confused  and  discon 
solate  state. 

He  was  presently  accosted  by  a  young  woman, 
who  appeared  to  be  roaming  through  the  build 
ing  in  a  state  even  more  dazed  and  forlorn  than 
his  own.  She  approached  him  with  appeal  so 


148 


plainly  written  on  her  features  that  his  hand 
went  instinctively  to  his  pocket  for  the  ready 
dime.  He  was  used  to  addresses  of  this  sort ; 
Brower  had  told  him  many  times  that  he  was 
a  "soft  mark."  He  soon  ascertained,  however, 
that  what  she  wanted  was  not  alms,  but  infor 
mation — an  appeal  which  is  more  familiar  still 
in  the  great  down-town  buildings ;  it  comes  fre 
quently  enough  from  simple,  inexperienced  creat 
ures  who  know  what  they  want,  but  not  at  all 
how  to  get  it. 

The  girl  thrust  back  a  straggling  lock  and 
gave  him  a  glance  both  wild  and  timid. 

"  Please,  sir,"  she  said,  "  do  you  know  any  one 
in  this  building  named  Yibert — in  an  insurance 
office?"  She  pronounced  the  name  with  an  ef 
fort  of  overcoming  its  strangeness. 

There  was  a  certain  primitiveness  in  her  speech ; 
it  was  provincial,  rustic  —  a  fine  ear  might  have 
called  it  uncouth. 

Ogden  was  struck  with  her  plaintive  "  please, 
sir."  He  had  never  before  heard  that  literary 
form  of  speech  in  actual  use. 

"  Well,"  he  said,  with  the  unceremonious  kind 
ness  proper  to  the  occasion  and  person,  "  I  think 
you  can  learn  something  about  him  in  the  office 
of  the  Yesuvian — next  floor  below." 

"  Oh,  thank  you,  sir !"  She  made  a  movement 
suggestive  of  an  abbreviated  courtesy ;  it  was  as 
much  in  the  way  of  acknowledgment  as  her 


"THE  GTRL  GAVE  HIM  A  GLANCE  WILD  AND  TTMID. 


149 


sense  of  strangeness  and  confusion  of  mind  ap 
peared  to  permit. 

"  Not  that  way,"  called  Ogden  after  her,  add 
ing  a  benevolent  postscript.  "  Here ;  come  along 
down  these  stairs  with  me ;  I'll  show  you  where 
it  is." 

She  stumbled  after  him  down  the  marble  steps 
with  a  heavy-footed  clatter  that  could  hardly 
have  been  expected  from  her  slightness,  and  with 
a  timorous  hold  on  the  bronze  of  the  hand-rail. 

"There,"  indicated  Ogden;  "the  sixth  door 
along,  on  the  right.  '  Yesuvian  Fire  Insurance 
Co.'  it  says."  And  he  himself  continued  an  ab 
stracted  descent  by  the  stairway. 

His  nearest  way  home  lay  through  the  court 
and  out  of  the  door  that  led  into  the  asphalted 
alley.  Just  within  the  archway  of  this  door  two 
men  stood.  The  one  was  Yibert  and  the  other 
was  a  dark  young  fellow  of  twenty  or  more 
whom  Ogden,  by  a  brief  glimmer  of  fancy,  made 
to  be  Brainard's  younger  son.  Yibert  was  in 
the  act  of  receiving  a  roll  of  bills  from  him. 

The  youth  had  a  pinched  and  slender  aspect ; 
there  was  a  furtive  tremulousness  in  his  hands ; 
his  eyes  were  reddish  and  the  pupils  swam  half 
hazily  in  a  lucent  humor. 

"I  didn't  know,  Mark,  but  what  you'd  gone 
back  on  me,  too,"  Yibert  was  saying  to  him. 
"  If  you'd  managed  to  get  around  a  little  sooner 
you'd  have  saved  a  certain  party  from  the  grand 


150 


razoo."  He  smiled  grimly.  "  It's  pretty  close 
sailing — thirty,  forty,  forty-five"- -he  ran  over 
the  bills,  rolled  them  up,  and  thrust  them  into 
his  pocket. 

The  boy  looked  at  him  with  some  doubt  and 
with  a  shade  of  fear.  He  seemed  to  have  been 
fascinated  and  then  dominated  by  the  bigness 
and  the  hardihood  of  the  other. 

"It's  all  right,  Mark,"  Yibert  presently  went 
on  with  a  dogged  vagueness;  "I'm  his  son,  too. 
Why  wouldn't  he  give  me  any  show?  "Why 
wouldn't  he  let  me  have  a  chance  to  show  him 
what  I  am  ?  Why  did  he  go  and  shut  down  on 
me  at  the  very  start  ?" 

"You!"  cried  the  boy.  "What  can  you  ex 
pect,  after  the  way  he's  treated  me  —  his  own 
son  ?  They're  up  there  now,  I  dare  say  " — with 
a  bitter  glance  towards  the  corner  of  the  Under 
ground — "  but  they  can  never  make  things  right 
with  me.  If  it  hadn't  been  for  Abbie — she's 
about  the  only  one  that's  turned  a  hand  for  me." 

"  Haven't  I  done  well  by  you,  too  ? — don't  for 
get  that.  Well,  you  don't — 'sh !  I  say  you  don't. 
Let  the  executors  settle,  and  give  'em  plenty 
to  settle,  too ;  they'll  get  enough  for  doing  it." 
Yibert  glanced  up  at  the  Underground  windows. 
"He  can't  live  forever."  He  brought  his  eyes 
back  to  the  boy.  "You've  got  to  live  yourself, 
though,  and  so  have  I.  You've  got  some  rights, 
haven't  you?" 


151 


The  boy  did  not  accept  this  cue ;  perhaps  he 
had  already  followed  it  more  than  once.  He 
studied  Yibert  with  eyes  that  seemed  to  indicate 
a  change  of  thought. 

"  Say,  Russ,"  he  hinted,  deprecatingly,  "  you're 
going  to  be  a  little  more  patient  with  May  me  ?" 

Yibert  scowled.  "Come,  now,  Marcus,  that's 
all  right ;  only  don't  let's  have  any  preaching. 
What  I  like  is  a  cheerful  house — and  an  orderly 
one.  Less  sniffling  and  better  meals.  I  guess 
you  won't  deny  that,  for  a  housekeeper,  your 
sister  is  a  good  deal  of  a  fizzle.  She  doesn't  have 
to  wash  her  own  dishes,  does  she?  And  that 
girl  I  got  her  does  the  scrubbing  and  takes  up 
the  ashes,  doesn't  she?  And  we  always  take  our 
dinners  out,  don't  we  ?  Well,  then  !  I  don't  see 
what  else  we  can  do  but  go  out  altogether." 

He  drubbed  his  foot  impatiently  on  the  pave 
ment. 

"  Well,  so  long !"  he  said  carelessly  to  his  com 
panion.  "Better  not  take  anything  more  this 
afternoon.  Do  I  see  you  on  the  track  to-mor 
row  ?" 

Ogden,  of  course,  heard  next  to  nothing  of 
this  talk,  and  his  own  preoccupations  left  him 
no  opportunity  to  scandalize  over  the  relations 
between  Yibert  and  the  young  woman  of  the 
corridors,  even  if  his  inclinations  had  run  that 
way.  But  it  need  not  be  denied  that  so  close 
a  grouping  of  these  various  persons  turned  his 


152 


thoughts  in  the  direction  of  the  Brainard  house 
hold,  and  his  feet  later  in  the  direction  of  the 
Brainard  house.  He  had  lately  been  cultivat 
ing  a  more  sympathetic  apprehension  of  Abbie 
Brainard's  position  ;  it  seemed  possible  that  an 
hour's  talk  would  offer  opportunity  for  the  deli 
cate  insinuation  of  his  friendly  interest.  He  re 
hearsed  a  number  of  suitable  phrases  ;  they  took 
felicitous  advantage  of  remarks  on  her  side — re 
marks  which  he  himself  constructed  —  and  left 
her,  as  she  thought  them  over,  in  no  doubt  of 
his  feeling  sense  of  her  position  and  of  his  de 
sire  to  make  his  sympathies  known  and  opera 
tive.  That  all  these  pretty  paces  would  have 
been  gone  through  in  the  absence  of  the  Valen 
tines  is  by  no  means  certain ;  but  their  presence 
excluded  the  least  attempt  to  try  them,  and  it 
was  with  lagging  feet  indeed  that  he  made  his 
late  return  home  to  Brower  and  "  Monte  Cristo." 


XII 

CORNELIA  MC^S"ABB'S  campaign  against  the  ten 
ants  of  the  Clifton  proceeded  apace.  Such  as 
pleased  her  fancy  or  promised  advantage  to  her 
future  she  attacked  one  by  one ;  she  made  quite 
a  succession  of  engagements,  dropping  here  and 
picking  up  there,  until  she  reached  the  point 
where,  for  as  many  hours  of  the  clay  as  she 
chose,  her  time  was  occupied,  and  occupied  to 
her  taste.  "We  have  already  seen  her  in  the  office 
of  the  Underground  National,  and  we  may  now 
see  her  in  the  office  of  the  Massachusetts  Brass 
Company.  She  did  good  work  within  tl]e  limits 
she  had  set  for  herself;  she  was  accurate  and 
fairly  rapid,  and  therefore  was  in  considerable 
request. 

"  I'd  a  good  deal  rather  work  around  like  this," 
she  expounded  to  Ogden,  one  day,  "than  put  in 
all  my  time  in  one  place.  Lots  more  variety,  to 
begin  with,  and  lots  more  pay.  'Most  every  one 
gives  me  half  as  much  as  I  could  get  in  any  sin 
gle  office ;  and  then  I  can  skip  around  and  have 
more  of  a  show.  You  can  talk  about  your  roll 
ing  stone  ;  that's  all  bosh." 

Cornelia  was  now  doing  a  daily  stint  of  an 


154 


hour  or  so  in  the  office  of  the  Brass  Company. 
This  hour  came  in  the  middle  of  the  forenoon, 
and  the  work  was  oftener  performed  under  the 
severe  eye  of  Mrs.  Floyd  than  our  young  amanu 
ensis  could  have  wished.  Mrs.  Floyd's  presence 
in  the  office  had  always  been  rather  frequent, 
and  her  prejudice  against  female  stenographers 
did  not  operate  to  make  it  any  the  less  so.  She 
bestowed  considerable  scrutiny  on  Cornelia,  and 
Cornelia  returned  the  interest  in  kind.  She  rec 
ognized  in  Mrs.  Floyd  one  of  the  minor  lights  of 
"  Society,"  and  she  became  more  deeply  indebted 
to  her  for  points  in  costume,  speech,  and  beha 
vior  than  either  perhaps  realized. 

Mrs.  Floyd  was  generally  accompanied  by  Miss 
Wilde.  This  provided  Cornelia  with  a  double 
course  of  instruction  :  she  learned  what  to  do 
and  what  to  avoid. 

Miss  Wilde  was  generally  accompanied  by  her 
hand-bag,  and  that  receptacle  was  capable  of  an 
endless  yield  of  documents  calculated  to  irritate 
and  perplex  her  brother-in-law.  Mrs.  Floyd  en 
couraged  this.  Who,  indeed,  should  take  an  in 
terest  in  the  affairs  of  her  own  sister  if  not  her 
own  husband? 

One  morning  Ann  produced  a  memorandum 
that  stunned  him.  As  he  studied  it  she  stood 
above  him  like  the  spirit  of  Bankruptcy. 

"  For  Heaven's  sake,  Walworth,  tell  me  what 
it  means.  Am  I  a  ruined  woman,  or  what  ?" 


155 


Floyd  glanced  at  the  sum  total;  the  figures 
mounted  high.  "  They  have  struck  you  pretty 
hard,  that's  a  fact." 

It  was  a  bill  for  special  assessments  levied  on 
the  possessions  of  Ann  E.  Wilde,  in  one  of  Mc 
Dowell's  subdivisions.  Paving,  so  much  ;  sewers 
and  water-mains,  so  much;  stone  sidewalk,  so 
much. 

"  And  eighteen  dollars  and  a  half  for  a  quarter 
of  a  lamp-post,"  wailed  Ann.  "Why,  Wai  worth, 
I  haven't  got  the  money  on  hand  for  all  this ;  I 
never  anticipated  such  a  thing." 

"  What's  a  quarter  of  a  lamp-post  good  for  ?" 
asked  her  sister. 

"I  suppose  the  cost  is  levied  on  four  property- 
owners,"  said  her  husband. 

"And  who's  going  to  see  by  it  when  it's  up?" 
asked  the  disconsolate  investor.  "  Nobody  ever 
goes  past." 

"Not  this  year,  perhaps;  but  there'll  be  plenty 
next  year.  You've  no  idea  how  the  town  is 
spreading  about.  Why  don't  you  step  upstairs 
and  see  McDowell  ?" 

"  Who  starts  these  things  going  ?"  asked  Ann. 
"  Who  fixes  the  amounts  ?" 

"I  guess  it's  done  sometimes  on  the  petition  of 
other  owners  about — according  to  the  frontage." 

"And  who's  the  principal  owner  all  about 
there?"  demanded  Ann.  "Ain't  it  McDowell 
himself  ?" 


156 


"  Well,  I  don't  suppose  he's  sold  off  very  much 
yet." 

"  And  so  he's  taxing  me  to  make  his  own  prop 
erty  more  valuable.  I  like  that.  I'm  glad  1 
went  to  him.  And  your  young  Ogden — I  sup 
pose  I  can  thank  him  for  this." 

"  Good  gracious,  Ann ;  McDowell  is  taxed,  too. 
The  town's  growing,  and  all  outlying  property  is 
subject  to  such  things.  And  don't  blame  poor 
Ogden." 

"  What  more  can  you  expect,  Ann,  in  such  a 
half-baked  place  as  this  ?"  queried  her  sister. 

"Go  up  and  see  McDowell,"  repeated  Wai- 
worth.  "  He  can  tell  you  all  about  it — when  it's 
payable,  and  how,  and  whether  there's  a  rebate 
or  anything."  He  passed  the  papers  back  to 
Ann  with  the  definitive  air  that  closes  a  matter. 
"Jessie  didn't  come  with  you,  then?"  he  in 
quired,  turning  towards  his  wife. 

"  JSro,  poor  thing ;  she  is  away  down  this 
morning.  Why,  what  do  you  think,  Wai  worth  ? 
They've  been  asking  her  if  she  can't  testify." 

"  Testify  fiddlesticks  !  What  could  she  say  ? 
They  don't  need  her ;  they've  got  a  clear  enough 
case  as  it  is." 

"  But  think  of  her  in  court." 

"Don't  think  of  her  in  court.  She  may  be 
a  thousand  miles  away  by  the  time  the  thing 
comes  up.  Has  anything  more  been  seen  or 
heard  of  that  interesting  vocalist  ?" 


157 


"  Nothing.  He  left  the  poor  child  all  alone  in 
that  big  place,  with  not  three  days'  supplies  and 
the—" 

She  looked  sharply  over  towards  Cornelia. 
The  girl's  hour  was  ended,  but  she  had  engaged 
in  a  pretence  of  tidying  up  the  desk. 

Ann  creased  her  papers  thoughtfully  between 
her  fingers.  "I  had  no  idea  that  curb-stones 
cost  so  much,"  she  sighed.  "  If  I  had  only  sold 
out  on  that  offer  last  month !" 

Cornelia  was  now  engaged  in  complicating  her 
apron-strings.  Her  interest  in  the  Underground 
people,  while  becoming  no  less  professional,  had 
become  a  good  deal  more  personal.  She  would 
have  given  anything  for  a  decent  pretext  to  re 
main.  It  was  hard  indeed  to  tear  herself  away 
from  this  discussion  of  the  affairs  of  Burton 
Brainard's  sister. 

" — and  the  gas  turned  off,"  Mrs.  Floyd  fin 
ished,  as  the  door  closed  on  the  reluctant  girl. 
"And  that's  the  state  Jessie  found  her  in — 
everything  just  about  as  bad  as  it  could  be." 

"Well,  no,"  Floyd  dissented,  thoughtfully. 
"There's  one  important  consolation — this  suit 
could  be  brought." 

"  Oh,  yes,"  answered  his  wife,  quickly.  "  This 
Canadian  woman  doesn't  claim  to  be  his  wife — 
only  that  she  ought  to  be,  and  that  he  promised 
to  make  her  so." 

"Interesting  family,"  murmured  "Walworth. 
"  Should  like  to  be  related  to  'em." 


158 


"  She  knew  him  in  Toronto.  She  found  him 
here  before  she  had  been  in  town  a  week." 

"  Small  world,"  remarked  Wai  worth,  negli 
gently.  He  played  with  his  penholders. 

Mrs.  Floyd  became  silent.  Gossip  seemed  out 
of  the  question  with  an  indifferent  husband  and 
a  preoccupied  sister. 

Yibert's  detection  by  the  girl  he  had  betrayed 
and  discarded,  and  his  desertion  of  his  young 
wife,  were  immediately  followed  by  the  proper 
steps  on  the  part  of  Brainard's  attorneys.  The 
old  man  had  received  the  intelligence  of  Yibert's 
double  misdeed  with  a  tremendous  outburst  of 
wrath  and  vituperation.  His  indignation  re 
vived  in  him  all  the  crude  violence  of  his  youth ; 
he  drew  out  from  the  disused  corners  of  his  mem 
ory  such  a  vocabulary  and  such  turns  of  phrase 
as  are  possible  only  to  one  whose  boyhood  has 
been  spent  on  the  crass  and  barbaric  frontier. 
He  towered  and  swayed  like  a  rank  plant  that 
has  sprung  rapidly  from  the  earth  and  has 
brought  up  the  slime  and  mould  on  its  sheath 
and  stalk.  His  prodigal  and  picturesque  inde 
cencies  were  heard  but  half  understandingly  by 
his  son,  and  were  lost,  as  to  everything  save 
their  animus,  on  his  advisers. 

The  equilibrium  of  the  scales  (whose  math 
ematical  poise  he  had  once  proven  to  his  own 
satisfaction)  was  now  destroyed  ;  this  outrage  on 
his  daughter  and  himself  and  all  his  belongings 


159 


put  another  and  a  different  face  on  the  matter. 
The  girl  was  received  back  into  her  father's 
house.  It  was  the  understanding  that  she  was 
to  remain  there  until  the  legal  undoing  of  all 
this  mischief  had  been  accomplished,  and  that, 
afterwards,  she  must  prepare  herself  for  an  in 
definite  exile  among  certain  of  her  father's  rela 
tives  still  resident  in  Centralia. 

During  this  interval  Brainard  allowed  him 
self  only  the  minimum  of  communication  with 
his  daughter ;  her  mother's  fluttering  sympathies 
were  too  tenuous  and  too  faded  to  furnish  any 
thing  very  definite  or  vivid  in  the  way  of  conso 
lation  ;  her  brother  did  not  readily  abandon  him 
self  to  the  softer  feelings — particularly  when 
work  of  so  much  sterner  character  was  before 
them  ;  and  but  for  her  sister  this  crushed  and  un 
fortunate  child  would  have  received  but  slender 
support  and  comfort.  Abbie  was  not  only  sister, 
but  mother  and  family  circle  too ;  she  found  a 
use  for  all  the  pent-up  tenderness  and  domestic 
ity  of  her  nature. 

The  bill  in  the  case  of  Vibert  vs.  Vibert  was 
filed  without  receiving  any  undue  attention  from 
the  press.  Some  exertions  Avere  taken,  some  in 
fluence  was  used,  and  the  matter  merely  made  a 
cold,  official,  numerical  appearance  in  the  legal 
columns  of  such  of  the  dailies  as  affect  complete 
court  reports.  The  relations  between  Yibert 
and  Jane  Doane,  however,  made  too  good  a 


160 


"story"  to  be  ignored  in  every  quarter;  some 
brief  mention  of  it  appeared  in  a  new  and  strug 
gling  one-cent  evening  paper.  The  friends  and 
well-wishers  of  the  Brainards  were  surprised  by 
the  extent  of  that  paper's  circulation — a  good 
many  people  appeared  to  have  seen  it. 

The  case  of  Vibert  vs.  Yibert  had  its  place 
near  the  head  of  a  short  docket  and  was  reached 
with  much  less  than  the  usual  delay.  It  was 
tried  quietly  and  privately  rather  late  one  after 
noon  at  a  sitting  which  might  have  been  termed 
either  a  prolongation  of  the  regular  session  or  a 
supplement  to  it.  Perhaps  only  a  legal  mind 
could  have  distinguished ;  probably  the  legal 
mind  that  dominated  the  occasion  did  not  at 
tempt  the  distinction. 

The  matter  was  adjusted  in  a  small  and  com 
pact  court-room  high  up  in  a  certain  vast  and  pil 
lared  pile — a  room  which  differed  little  in  size 
and  not  greatly  in  furnishings  from  an  ordinary 
office.  The  court  reporters  and  the  crowd  of 
court  loungers  had  withdrawn ;  nobody  remained 
behind  save  the  clerk  and  a  bailiff  or  two.  Yet 
the  spectre  of  publicity  seemed  hovering  there ; 
it  hurled  a  flood  of  glaring  light  in  through  the 
high  and  curtainless  windows,  it  shimmered  on 
the  staring  yellow  oak  furnishings  of  bench  and 
bar,  and  it  searched  out  the  darkest  corner  of  the 
yawning  jury-box.  Abbie  Brainard,  standing 
beside  her  sister,  peopled  all  this  void  with  jar- 


161 


goning  lawyers  and  callous  constables  and  mali 
cious  witnesses  and  indifferent  jurymen  and 
sharp-witted  reporters  and  trivial,  time-killing 
spectators ;  and  then,  she  set  her  unveiled  sister 
in  that  revolving  witness-chair  and  brought  to 
bear  upon  her  the  searching  glare  from  the  lofty 
windows  and  the  more  pitiless  glare  of  the  thou 
sand-eyed  crowd.  She  shuddered,  and  thanked 
Heaven — without  going  too  deeply  beneath  the/ 
surface  of  things — that  present  conditions  were 
so  favorable. 

For  they  involved  none  of  the  ordinary  phe 
nomena  of  a  "  trial."  There  was  no  wrangling, 
no  eloquence,  no  auditory ;  there  was  no  humil 
iation — beyond  that  which  was  inevitable.  It 
was  hardly  more  than  a  conference.  The  judge, 
with  a  quiet  gravity,  took  a  simple  conversa 
tional  tone — a  keynote  to  which  the  indigna 
tion  of  Burt,  the  mortification  of  his  sister,  the 
sorrow  of  Jane  Doane,  and  the  juvenility  of 
Freddy  Pratt  all  came  to  be  attuned.  There 
was  a  simple  recital  of  uncombated  facts,  the 
separation  was  decreed,  and  Mary  Yibert  was 
presently  at  liberty  to  resume  her  maiden 
name.  It  was  considered  best  that  she  be 
known  henceforth  as  Mrs.  Mary  Brainard. 
There  was  no  report  in  the  next  day's  papers, 
nor  the  next ;  on  the  third  day  things  took  a 
different  turn. 

One  or  two  of  the  newspapers  had  sacrificed 
11 


162 


the  Yibert-Doane  story  with  considerable  reluc 
tance.  They  felt  a  certain  degree  of  martyrdom, 
too,  in  withholding  their  hand  from  Brainard, 
who  had  been  a  standard  subject  of  attack 
throughout  the  careers  of  all  the  younger  writ 
ers.  Nor  were  they  at  all  sure  that  their  posi 
tion  as  guardians  of  the  public  morals  justified 
any  such  suppression  of  the  truth.  They  learned 
of  the  clandestine  trial  of  the  Yibert  case,  and 
that  decided  them.  Their  virtue  was  strength 
ened  ;  the  whole  affair  was  reopened  and 
thoroughly  ventilated.  The  encroachments  of 
wealth  and  privilege  were  held  up  before  the 
alarmed  eyes  of  the  public;  the  entire  episode, 
with  everything  leading  up  to  it,  was  minutely 
rehearsed.  A  good  many  people  were  inter 
viewed — a  few  who  knew  something  of  the  cir 
cumstances,  a  good  many  who  did  not.  Repor- 
torial  requisitions  were  also  made  on  the  bank 
and  the  house.  Some  persons  contributed  facts 
relating  to  the  matter  in  hand ;  others,  facts  re 
lating  to  matters  whose  connection  was  not  so 
close;  still  others  volunteered  opinions  on  the 
method  of  procedure  that  made  the  trial  note 
worthy.  "Vox  Populi"  and  "Kuat  Coelum" 
wrote  letters  "  to  the  editor."  Hough  cuts  from 
sketches  and  photographs  made  their  appear 
ance.  The  whole  career  of  Brainard  was  re 
viewed  with  merciless  detail,  and  the  issue  of 
one  edition  of  a  particular  publication  was  at- 


163 


tended  with  the  shouting  of  his  name  through 
the  streets.  Certain  sheets  whose  existence  is 
unknown  to  the  majority  of  reputable  people 
and  whose  circulation  is  in  accordance  therewith, 
gave  their  clients  a  scare-head  full  of  exclama 
tion-points  ;  and  one  pink  publication,  whose 
single  connection  with  respectability  is  through 
the  barber-shops,  devoted  its  whole  front  page 
to  the  illustration  of  the  case :  the  wronged  girl 
claimed  her  surpliced  betrayer  at  the  altar-rail, 
while  the  equally  wronged  wife  swooned  in  a 
front  pew.  There  was  an  appropriate  Gothic 
background,  while  one  corner  of  the  foreground 
— piquant  touch  of  innocence — was  filled  in  by 
an  open-eyed  choir-boy. 

All  these  manifestations  of  public  interest 
caused  Ogden  a  keen  personal  distress  that  sur 
prised  him.  He  heard  the  names  of  Brainard 
and  Yibert  bawled  in  the  streets.  He  became 
familiar,  for  the  first  time,  with  the  salient 
points  in  Brainard's  career.  He  heard  himself 
referred  to  once  or  twice  as  a  clerk  in  Brainard's 
bank.  As  he  handled  that  pink  sheet  in  the 
Clifton  barber-shop  while  awaiting  his  turn,  he 
half  expected  some  acquaintance  to  brand  him 
as  a  caller  at  Brainard's  house.  As  he  lay,  lath 
ered  and  defenceless,  in  his  chair,  he  almost 
dreaded  lest  some  pitiless  friend  might  happen 
in  and  stamp  him  as  a  suitor  for  the  hand  of 
Brainard's  daughter.  .  .  .  He  paused  and  blushed 


164 


under  the  barber's  eye ;  he  saw  now  the  reason 
for  his  personal  distress  over  these  odious  domes 
tic  entanglements.  His  surprise  passed  away, 
but  it  left  behind  it  a  distress  greater  still. 


XIII 

THE  appearance  and  deportment  of  young 
Frederick  Pratt  as  a  witness  in  the  Yibert  case 
offered  several  delicate  shades  whose  noting  and 
whose  accounting  for  may  justify  a  paragraph 
or  two.  His  general  effect,  then,  was  in  the 
highest  degree  sobered,  chastened,  depressed. 
To  what  was  this  to  be  attributed  ? 

To  his  consciousness  of  the  overshadowing 
majesty  of  the  law  ?  ]STo ;  for  the  law  had 
turned  its  softest  and  most  silken  side  outward  ; 
the  little  party  had  taken  up  its  informal  group 
ing  at  the  judge's  elbow  and  had  replied  con 
versationally  to  the  interrogations  of  the  judge 
himself  or  to  the  prompting  inquiries  of  Brain- 
ard's  attorney.  Justicia  had  appeared  in  her 
most  sympathetic  and  domestic  aspect. 

Was  the  youth  disappointed  as  to  his  perform 
ance  of  a  lean  role  f  There  is  no  doubt  that  he 
had  anticipated  with  some  relish  his  first  appear 
ance  in  the  witness-box.  He  would  have  been 
obliged,  it  is  true,  to  confess  himself  a  minor, 
and  he  might  have  been  exposed  to  the  humili 
ating  necessity  of  declaring  that  he  understood 
the  nature  of  an  oath ;  but  after  that  all  would 


166 


have  been  smooth  sailing.  Only  to  be  for  full 
fifteen  minutes  the  observed  of  all  observers,  to 
be  able  to  lift  up  his  voice  and  tell — all— he- 
knew  !  Yet  to  be  balked  in  this  called  for  exas 
peration  rather  than  deep  dejection,  and  deep 
dejection,  after  all,  was  what  he  chiefly  showed. 

Was  this  dejection  the  sign  of  sympathetic 
sorrow  for  the  woes  of  his  former  friend  and 
playmate?  Not  quite.  His  sympathy,  while 
real  enough,  was  largely  the  sprightly  product 
of  novelty,  curiosity,  and  conscious  self-impor 
tance  ;  unentangled  with  other  considerations, 
it  would  have  shown  itself  in  a  nervous  and 
volatile  loquacity. 

But  Freddy  in  court  was  not  loquacious ;  he 
gave  his  testimony  after  a  benumbed  and  back 
ward  fashion  that  indicated  other  and  deeper 
troubles.  The  boy,  in  fact,  was  under  a  cloud. 
An  issue  of  some  importance  had  arisen  between 
the  Underground  National  Bank  and  its  young 
est  messenger;  it  involved  no  less  a  question 
than  that  of  meum  and  tuum.  Freddy  Pratt, 
as  messenger,  had  been  in  the  habit  of  making 
two  or  three  daily  trips  through  the  business  dis 
trict,  during  which  the  notes  and  acceptances 
that  filled  his  big  official  wallet  came  to  be 
exchanged  for  checks  and  greenbacks  that  rep 
resented  corresponding  values.  One  or  two  dis 
crepancies  had  developed  that  called  for  atten 
tion. 


167 


The  boy's  father  came  down  to  the  Under 
ground  to  contribute  his  share  of  this  attention. 
He  was  a  grave,  repressive,  saturnine  person, 
who  might  have  been  set  down  as  possessed  of 
far  greater  means  to  meet  the  requirements  of  a 
growing  boy  in  the  midst  of  a  circle  of  well-to- 
do  urban  acquaintances  than  of  inclination  to 
study  those  requirements.  He  was  received  in 
Brainard's  own  private  room,  and  the  affairs  of 
the  penitent  and  sobbing  boy  were  discussed 
over  his  head  by  his  parent  and  his  employer. 

"  You  foolish  child,"  said  the  elder  Pratt  to 
his  son,  in  the  self-conscious  tone  by  which  we 
address  age  through  youth  ;  "  if  you  wanted  any 
thing,  why  didn't  you  ask  me  for  it  ?" 

This  father,  seriously  handicapped  as  he  was 
by  his  own  temperament,  was  attempting  to 
treat  the  matter  as  something  rather  slight  and 
trivial.  The  pettiness  of  the  amount  involved, 
the  perfect  ease  of  restitution,  the  youth  of  the 
offender,  the  utter  simplicity  and  primitiveness 
of  his  method— all  these  he  touched  upon  with  a 
feint  of  light-handed  ease.  Another  might  have 
blown  an  airy  bubble  like  this,  even  in  the  face 
of  Brainard's  ominous  and  taciturn  frown  ;  but 
Pratt  was  not  the  man  to  do  it.  He  soon  left 
the  upper  air  of  informal  jocularity  for  the  firmer 
ground  of  argument  and  expostulation,  and  this 
ground,  before  he  ended,  was  almost  pressed  by 
the  knees  of  entreaty. 


168 

"  It's  plain  enough,"  said  Brainard,  at  length ; 
"  he  took  it,  and  he  kept  it." 

Each  one,  from  his  own  point  of  view,  cast  his 
eye  on  the  culprit. 

"  But  it  can't  be  that  you  mean  to  ruin  a  boy's 
future  in  any  such  way  as  this?"  snarled  the 
boy's  father  "with  a  rasping  expostulation. 

Brainard  turned  a  look  on  him  from  under  his 
overhanging  brows. 

"  Um,"  he  merely  said,  in  a  voice  which  might 
have  meant  anything. 

But  the  affair  presently  came  to  adjustment — 
a  treaty  with  several  clauses.  Brainard  wished 
to  use  the  boy  in  court ;  to  dispose  of  the  Vibert 
matter  in  the  cursory  fashion  that  he  hoped  to 
follow  permitted  scant  margin  for  the  plea  of 
desertion,  and  he  was  depending  on  young  Pratt 
for  the  recital  of  certain  occurrences  which,  in  a 
cumulative  way,  might  have  their  bearings  on 
the  plea  of  cruelty.  Pratt,  Jr.,  was  to  testify  in 
court,  Pratt,  Sr.,  was  to  reimburse  the  bank,  and 
the  boy's  final  dismissal  from  the  Underground 
wrould  then  be  timed  in  a  way  so  disassociated 
from  any  particular  cause  as  to  excite  no  com 
ment  and  to  occasion  no  injury.  But  all  this 
was  scant  and  nominal  payment  for  Brainard's 
clemency  ;  a  larger  one  followed. 

Brainard  owned  a  number  of  woe-begone  tene 
ments  scattered  here  and  there  over  that  unat 
tractive  part  of  the  West  Side  which  is  most 


169 


affected  by  manufacturers  of  furniture.  One  of 
these  tumble-down  dwellings  adjoined  a  large  lot 
owned  by  Ingles — took  out  one  corner,  in  fact,  in 
such  a  way  as  to  interfere  seriously  with  its  value 
for  building  purposes.  Ingles,  in  treaty  with  a 
furniture  firm  for  the  putting  up  of  a  building, 
had  made  an  offer  for  this  corner.  Brainard, 
informed  as  to  the  circumstances,  had  put  a  price 
on  it  that  was  excessive — exorbitant.  Ingles  had 
taken  time  for  consideration;  and  at  the  very 
moment  of  Pratt's  call  a  letter  from  him  lay  on 
Brainard's  desk,  to  the  effect  that  he  was  looking 
elsewhere  ;  evidently,  on  principle,  he  was  draw 
ing  off.  Brainard  had  no  use  for  the  property, 
and  it  was  hardly  paying  taxes.  He  wanted  to 
sell  it  at  his  own  figure,  and  he  had  expected 
to.  Ingles's  tactics  nettled  him ;  he  solaced  him 
self  by  a  step  that  reached  Ingles  and  Pratt  at 
the  same  time.  He  sardonically  raised  his  price 
a  peg  higher,  and  offered  the  property  to  Pratt 
with  an  intimation  that  refusal  would  not  be 
entertained.  He  put  his  lot  still  further  beyond 
the  reach  of  Ingles's  possible  necessities,  and  he 
made  it  realize  even  more  than  Ingles  had  de 
clined  to  pay.  Pratt  swallowed  this  mouthful 
with  such  grace  as  he  could  command  ;  and  with 
the  celerity  possible  to  a  perfected  system  of 
land  transfer  when  supplemented  by  the  guaran 
tee  of  a  title  company,  Norval  II.  Pratt,  in  a 
day  or  two,  became  the  owner,  at  an  excessive 


170 


price,  of  a  piece  of  property  for  which  he  had 
no  use,  and  for  which,  so  far  as  he  knew,  no  one 
else  had  any  use  either. 

This  transaction  was  at  once  noted  by  Mc 
Dowell,  whose  study  of  the  daily  transfers  as 
reported  in  the  real-estate  publications  was  mi 
nute,  and  whose  attention  had  been  fixed  for  some 
time  on  this  particular  piece  of  ground.  He 
knew  something  of  Ingles's  intentions,  through 
the  people  whom  Ingles  was  endeavoring  to  ac 
commodate,  and  he  saw  here  the  entering  wedge 
that  he  had  waited  for  so  long.  He  had  ap 
proached  Brainard  unsuccessfully ;  he  now  tried 
Pratt.  Pratt,  who  figured  himself  justly  enough 
as  a  lamb  led  to  the  shearing,  made  no  effort  to 
evade  the  role ;  he  promptly  made  an  agreement 
for  the  transfer  of  the  Brainard  lot  to  McDow 
ell.  He  let  it  go  at  a  decided  sacrifice— he  sold 
it  at  a  possible  shade  under  its  actual  value. 

McDowell,  whose  eagerness  had  committed 
him  to  an  out-and-out  purchase,  was  now  in  a 
position  to  approach  Ingles.  He  was  willing  to 
sell  the  ground  for  simply  what  it  had  cost  him ; 
his  profits  would  come  later,  through  that  open 
door  between  1262  and  1263.  Ingles  received  him 
coldly.  He  had  disposed,  he  said,  of  his  holdings 
in  that  neighborhood,  and  was  using  the  pro 
ceeds  to  build  for  his  new  tenants  in  another 
quarter.  He  bowed  McDowell  out  with  a  faintly 
cynical  contempt,  and  this  enterprising  person 


171 


was  left  with  an  unpromising  piece  of  ground 
on  his  hands  to  dispose  of  as  best  he  might.  He 
tried  the  new  purchasers  of  Ingles's  lot;  his  own 
was  not  necessary  to  their  purposes. 

McDowell  was  seriously  embarrassed.  This 
bit  of  ground  was  a  trifle  in  itself — to  Ingles  or 
to  Pratt  it  mattered  little  either  way ;  but  to 
McDowell,  who  was  of  a  considerably  smaller 
calibre,  the  thing  came  as  a  kind  of  last  straw. 
In  expectation  of  great  activity  in  acres  he  had 
loaded  himself  down  with  outside  property ; 
everything  of  his  own  was  invested  in  that  way, 
everything  that  was  his  wife's,  and  something, 
to  tell  the  truth,  that  was  neither  his  nor  his 
wife's.  He  was  in  up  to  his  chin,  and  at  this 
moment  came  Ogden,  asking  him  in  set  terms 
for  an  accounting  and  a  settlement. 

McDowell  met  this  demand  with  a  promise 
of  figures,  and  he  renewed  this  promise  several 
times.  The  intervals  between  gave  opportunity 
for  a  slow  insinuation  of  the  truth — for  a  grad 
uated  confession  that  a  considerable  part  of  old 
Mr.  Ogden's  estate  was  tied  up  in  the  operations 
of  his  son-in-law.  This  confession  was  followed 
by  his  statement ;  but  it  was  some  time  before 
the  account  opened  at  the  Underground  by 
George  received  any  great  enlargement  through 
the  agent  of  the  administratrix. 

"  It's  all  right,  though,"  McDowell  said  ;  "you 
don't  need  to  worry,  and  there's  no  use  in  stir- 


172 

ring  things  up.     There's  big  money  ahead,  and 
you'll  stand  in." 

But  the  statement  was  the  ground,  and  a  suf 
ficient  one,  for  a  rupture.  McDowell,  in  order 
to  diminish  his  indebtedness  to  the  estate,  had 
charged  it  with  various  fees  and  percentages  of 
his  own,  and  with  numerous  items  that  properly 
concerned  his  individual  and  household  expenses. 
He  charged  the  estate  with  a  new  porch  on  the 
front  of  his  own  house,  and  with  the  full  ex 
pense  of  railway  travel  which  had  been  under 
taken  in  great  part  for  his  own  interests.  He 
even  made  a  hardy  attempt  to  force  the  Brainard 
lot  upon  the  indignant  widow. 

Mrs.  Ogden  immediately  left  his  house,  in  spite 
of  the  good  offices  of  her  bewildered  daughter. 
George  himself,  forecasting  the  future,  beheld  a 
long  succession  of  wrangling  days  in  the  law- 
courts  and  in  the  offices  of  attorneys — days  that 
threatened  to  surpass  in  worry,  loss,  expense, 
and  nerve-wear  anything  that  his  family  had 
experienced  yet.  He  felt  himself  on  the  thresh 
old  of  a  struggle  for  which  he  was  but  scantily 
equipped,  and  in  which  he  was  certain  to  be  se 
riously  handicapped  through  consideration  for 
.Kittle. 

Absorbed  in  these  moody  reflections,  he  was 
crossing  the  court  of  the  Clifton  on  a  Saturday 
afternoon  when  a  pencil-tap  on  one  of  the  great 
glass  panes  took  his  attention.  The  tap  was 


173 


sounded  on  the  court  frontage  of  Darrell  & 
Bradley's  branch,  and  George  started  from  his 
revery  to  see  the  face  of  Bradley  himself  looking 
out  at  him  over  the  rulers,  mucilage  bottles,  and 
memorandum  -  books  that  formed  symmetrical 
piles  within. 

Bradley  hastened  to  throw  open  the  narrow 
glass  door  adjoining  the  show-window,  and  mo 
tioned  George  in  with  a  friendly  and  quizzical 
grimace. 

"Let  Jones  walk,"  he  said,  crinkling  up  his 
eyes  and  laying  his  fat  hand  on  Ogden's  shoul 
der. 

"  He  is  walking,"  responded  George,  with  a 
wan  smile. 

Bradley  drew  him  in  and  closed  the  door. 

"  Well,  let  him  walk  in  a  different  path,  then. 
Let  him  come  out  to  Hinsdale  to-morrow  and 
try  the  primrose  path." 

"  Of  dalliance  ?"  asked  George,  with  a  doleful 
attempt  to  meet  half-way  the  cheery  facetious- 
ness  of  the  other. 

"  Well,  I  don't  think  a  little  dalliance  would 
hurt  him."  Bradley  made  it  seem  quite  absurd 
that  a  young  fellow  of  twenty -five  should  have 
any  real  cares  and  annoyances.  "  All  work  and 
no  pla}^ — you  know." 

"I'm  afraid  so,"  admitted  George,  with  a 
pathos  that  the  elder  man  found  amusing. 

Bradley  stepped  back  to  a  snug  office  that  was 


174' 


stowed  away  behind  a  tall  piece  of  shelving 
piled  with  newly  bound  account-books,  to  pick 
up  his  hat.  "  I'm  glad  to  have  caught  sight  of 
you,"  he  proceeded,  with  the  friendliness  of  an 
elder  brother ;  "  I've  just  taken  an  hour  or  so  to 
overhaul  things  here  a  little.  If  you're  going 
north,  I'll  walk  a  block  or  two  with  you." 

They  passed  out  into  the  street  and  picked 
their  way  along  through  the  splashing,  slumping, 
and  dripping  that  marks  the  spring  break-up. 
They  elbowed  other  pedestrians  over  miry  flag 
gings,  and  they  dodged  the  muddy  spray  that 
bumping  trucks  sent  up  from  the  street  -  car 
tracks  at  almost  every  crossing. 

"  My  wife's  wondering  what  has  become  of 
you,"  Bradley  puffed  out  among  many  other 
things,  as  he  tried  to  keep  up  with  Ogden's 
supple  and  light-footed  gait.  "  And  Jessie,  too. 
She's  home  to-morrow  —  just  back  from  Evan- 
ston.  You  come  out  on  the  eleven  fifty-five,  and 
we'll  have  an  early  dinner,  and  that  will  leave 
enough  of  the  afternoon  to  make  things  worth 
while.  And  we'll  show  you  that  spring  is  a 
little  nearer  at  hand  than  you'd  suspect  in  town. 
Your  first  spring  here  ?" 

"Yes." 

"  Pretty  bad,  ain't  it  ?" 

"  Worse  than  Boston,"  said  George,  in  a  tone 
implying  that  nothing  further  could  be  added. 

At  the  next  corner  Bradley  paused,  detaining 
him  for  a  moment  with  a  friendly  hand. 


175 

"  Sunday  noon,  then.  You  provide  the  dal 
liance  and  we'll  see  to  the  primroses.  Care  any 
thing  for  'em  ?" 

"  Oh,  yes,  indeed." 

"  Good  thing ;  can't  have  chrysanthemums 
all  the  year  round.  Well,  good-by.  Jessie  will 
drive  down  for  you  in  the  buggy." 

"  I'll  be  there,"  called  Ogden,  as  they  drifted 
apart  in  the  thickening  crowd. 

He  had  reached  the  point  where  he  felt  it 
would  be  a  relief  to  cut  away  from  town  and 
everything  in  it  —  the  bustle,  the  uproar,  the 
filth,  the  routine  of  the  bank,  the  complications 
of  the  Brainards,  the  entanglements  of  the  Og- 
dens.  It  was  a  simple  thing  to  do  —  only  so 
many  miles  of  flimsy  and  shabby  shanties  and 
back  views  of  sheds  and  stables ;  of  grimy,  cin 
dered  switch  -  yards,  with  the  long  flanks  of 
freight-houses  and  interminable  strings  of  loaded 
or  empty  cars;  of  dingy  viaducts  and  groggy 
lamp-posts  and  dilapidated  fences  whose  scanty 
remains  called  to  remembrance  lotions  and  ton 
ics  that  had  long  passed  their  vogue ;  of  groups 
of  Sunday  loungers  before  saloons,  and  gangs  of 
unclassifiable  foreigners  picking  up  bits  of  coal 
along  the  tracks ;  of  muddy  crossings  over  roads 
whose  bordering  ditches  were  filled  with  flocks 
of  geese ;  of  wide  prairies  cut  up  by  endless 
tracks,  dotted  with  pools  of  water,  and  rustling 
with  the  dead  grasses  of  last  summer ;  then  sub- 


176 


urbs  new  and  old — some  in  the  fresh  promise  of 
sidewalks  and  trees  and  nothing  else,  others  un 
kempt,  shabby,  gone  to  seed ;  then  a  high  pas 
sage  over  a  marshy  plain,  a  range  of  low 
wooded  hills,  emancipation  from  the  dubious 
body  known  as  the  Cook  County  Commissioners 
— and  Hinsdale. 

At  the  station  Jessie  Bradley  sat  drawn  up  in 
a  buggy ;  she  had  her  place  in  a  small  conven 
tion  of  phaetons,  carryalls,  and  express-wagons. 
She  tossed  her  head  brightly  and  waved  her 
whip. 

"  I  could  have  walked  as  well  as  not,"  said 
Ogden,  climbing  in.  "  What's  half  a  mile  ?" 

"  Three  quarters — almost,"  she  corrected.  She 
gathered  up  the  lines  and  secured  the  approved 
hold  on  the  whip.  "Unless  you  care  to  drive  ?" 
she  suggested. 

"  Not  particular,"  replied  Ogden,  leaning  back 
easily.  "  Quite  willing  to  be  a  passenger." 

He  took  a  look  at  her  sidewise  from  behind. 
She  wore  a  pert  little  flat-brimmed,  flat-crowned 
hat,  set  straight  on  the  top  of  her  head  ;  a  stray 
lock  of  hair  brushed  across  her  ear  in  the  breeze ; 
she  had  a  bunch  of  pale  purple  primroses  at  her 
throat. 

"  You  may  if  you  want  to,"  she  said,  with  a 
sudden  turn  in  his  direction.  Her  eyes  snapped 
and  sparkled. 

"  I'd  as  soon  see  you — unless  you  don't  care  to." 


177 


"  Ohj  as  far  as  that  goes !  Just  hold  on  tight, 
though.  Get  up,  John !" 

She  drew  a  taut  rein  and  flicked  the  horse 
over  the  ear.  He  was  a  mettlesome  five-year- 
old,  and  he  rushed  into  his  best  gait  at  once. 
"  Here  we  go !"  she  cried,  "  Sunday  or  no  Sun 
day.  I  hate  to  poke." 

She  rushed  him  through  the  outskirts  of  the 
town;  she  bumped  over  the  cumbrous  plank 
crossings,  she  grazed  one  or  two  of  the  wooden 
posts  that  held  up  oil-lamps,  she  charged  a  flock 
on  its  homeward  way  from  church  and  cut  it  into 
two  frightened  and  indignant  halves.  She  was 
on  her  native  heath ;  she  felt  it ;  she  showed  it. 

George  grasped  the  buggy -cover  with  his  left 
hand  and  held  his  right  in  readiness  to  seize  the 
reins.  The  buggy,  with  many  a  bump  and  sud 
den  wrench,  sped  on  over  the  stones  and  ruts 
and  puddles  and  rough  crossings  of  an  indiffer 
ent  country  road,  and  presently  it  turned  into  a 
yard  with  a  rasping  graze  on  one  of  the  two 
painted  white  posts  that  made  the  entrance  way. 
On  the  side  porch  of  the  house  stood  the  girl's 
parents.  They  were  laughing. 

Jessie  jumped  out  briskly.  She  struck  a  mas 
culine  attitude  on  the  carriage-block,  her  right 
hand  resting  on  the  stock  of  her  whip,  her  left 
arm  a-kimbo. 

"  I  was  to  get  yer  through  on  time ;  them  was 
my  orders,  and  here  ye  are !" 
12 


178 


George  climbed  out  carefully. 

"  Poor  Horace !"  chuckled  Bradley,  coming 
down;  "he's  here  all  right,  but  is  he  able  to 
give  his  lecture  ?" 

Mrs.  Bradley  followed,  to  shake  hands.  She 
wore  a  black  silk  dress,  and  there  was  a  bit  of 
lace  over  her  thin  hair — an  adornment  which  her 
consciousness  seemed  to  put  forth  as  a  modish 
novelty.  Her  wrinkles  all  flowed  together  in  a 
companionable  smile. 

"  He  may  have  lost  his  voice  on  the  way,"  she 
joked,  "but  we  hope  he  saved  his  appetite." 

"  They're  both  all  right,"  said  George,  laugh 
ing  in  turn. 

Bradley  was  at  the  horse's  head.  "  The  voice 
is  there,  anyway,"  he  said  in  cautious  acknowl 
edgment.  "  And  we'll  see  about  the  appetite  as 
soon  as  you've  got  enough  spare  breath  to  say 
'  Amen '  to  our  grace/' 

The  Bradley  house  was  a  mere  box  of  a  build 
ing  set  in  an  acre  lot.  They  had  built  for  them 
selves,  on  finally  breaking  with  the  city,  two 
years  before  ;  and  they  had  accepted  the  gables 
and  dormers  and  shingles  and  the  brown  and 
yellow  paint  that  the  modest  suburban  house  of 
the  period  finds  it  so  difficult  to  evade.  They 
stood  on  high,  roiling  ground ;  there  were  half- 
hints  of  considerable  vistas  here  and  there,  and 
they  were  surrounded  by  groves  and  copses 
through  which,  to-day,  the  first  faint  colors  of 


179 


the  spring  were  hurtling.  Bradley,  after  dinner, 
walked  Ogclen  around  the  house — previous  visits 
had  been  confined  to  the  parlor.  He  dwelt  on 
the  swelling  of  the  lilac  buds,  and  he  drew  at 
tention  with  an  impartial  interest  to  the  first 
sproutings  of  his  peonies  and  of  his  rhubarb. 
The  back  of  the  place  was  littered  with  the 
debris  of  a  second  green-house  in  an  advanced 
stage  of  construction,  and  through  this  disorder 
he  picked  his  way,  along  with  his  daughter  and 
his  guest,  towards  the  door  of  the  first. 

"  Hop  in,"  said  Bradley,  lifting  his  own  foot 
over  the  perpendicular  threshold.  The  air  within 
was  but  a  few  degrees  warmer  than  the  air  with 
out,  yet  closer.  On  either  side  stretched  frag- 
mental  beds  of  young  plants,  with  frequent 
breaks  between.  "  It's  late  for  prims,  after  all ; 
and  a  good  many  of  them  are  outside,  anyway." 
He  waved  his  hand  over  a  few  patches  of  color 
on  the  left ;  there  were  white,  pink,  cherry,  pale 
purple,  such  as  Jessie  was  wearing,  and  a  few  be 
lated  clumps  of  young  and  indeterminate  green. 

Ogden  passed  to  and  fro,  with  the  oh's  and 
all's  that  accompany  the  exposition  of  any  host's 
pet  hobby,  however  partial  and  trifling  the  ex 
hibit  may  be.  He  had  done  the  same  last  autumn 
with  the  chrysanthemums. 

Bradley  took  this  tribute  with  the  customary 
complacency,  and  presently  drifted  to  one  side 
for  a  word  with  his  man  about  a  small  matter  of 


180 


glazing — he  had  quite  an  eye  for  broken  panes. 
Ogden  leaned  against  a  damp  ledge.  Jessie  had 
seated  herself  on  one  of  the  steps  of  a  rude  flow 
er-stand;  she  brushed  aside  two  or  three  small 
pots  that  had  been  left  standing  on  it. 

She  showed  an  air  of  lassitude ;  it  had  been 
stealing  over  her  all  through  dinner,  and  now  it 
had  completely  overtaken  her  in  the  languid  at 
mosphere  of  the  flowers.  Her  slender  arms  hung 
limply,  and  she  moved  her  back  as  if  to  find  a 
comfortable  rest  for  it.  Her  face,  under  the  pal 
lor  of  the  painted  glass,  looked  rather  colorless 
and  a  little  drawn,  and  a  languorous  apathy 
seemed  to  have  taken  the  sparkle  from  her  eyes. 

She  looked  up  at  him  as  she  dropped  the  pet 
als  of  a  primrose  one  by  one.  "  You  didn't  care 
to  drive,  then  ?" 

"  Did  you  want  me  to  ?  I'm  sorry  not  to  have 
understood.  You  drove  down,  and  so  I  thought- 
Was  it  too  much  for  you,  both  ways  ?" 

"  Oh,  no.  It  only  struck  me  that  you  might 
want  to.  You  were  not — that  is,  you  understand 
horses  ?" 

"  Certainly  ;  I  drive  on  occasion."  He  smiled 
serenely,  not  in  the  least  disturbed  by  her  per 
fectly  obvious  thought.  "  However,  a  wise  man 
never  goes  out  of  his  way  to  handle  a  strange 
horse — perhaps  that  isn't  one  of  Solomon's  prov 
erbs,  but  it  ought  to  be." 

"  You  are  awfully  cautious."     She  rose  unde- 


181 


cidedly,  and  presently  she  sat  down  again  with  a 
little  sigh. 

"  I  have  to  be.  That  is  my  business — from 
half-past  eight  till  four.  Perhaps  it's  growing 
on  me." 

"  I  don't  mean  that.  You  were  born  cautious ; 
you'd  be  cautious  anyway." 

"I'm  a  Down-easter,  you  know.  Look  before 
you  leap.  Perhaps  I  shall  learn  the  off-hand 
Western  ways  in  time.  I'll  try  to.  I'll  make 
myself  over." 

"  I  wonder  if  you  can,"  she  said,  half  to  her 
self.  Then  aloud  : 

"But  I  don't  believe  all  Down-easters  are  as 
careful  as  you  are.  There  must  be  lots  of  them 
who  would  have  just  laid  the  whip  on  that  horse, 
and  run  over  a  boy  or  two,  and  knocked  our 
gate-post  to  pieces,  and  come  up  to  the  door 
with  a  wheel  just  ready  to  break  to  flinders. 
Why  couldn't  you  have  done  it  ?  I  shouldn't 
have  minded  it — I  should  have  liked  it  first-rate." 
She  spoke  with  a  kind  of  lingering  drawl,  and 
there  was  a  half-smile  in  her  lack-lustre  eye. 

"  Your  father  would  have  minded  it,  though, 
and  so  should  I.  Never  begin  to  dance  without 
arranging  about  the  fiddler — good  rule,  don't  you 
think?" 

She  threw  a  bare  stem  to  the  ground.  "  Oh, 
yes ;  but  tiresome."  She  rose.  "  Close  in  here, 
isn't  it  ?  Let's  go  outside." 


XIV 

THE  sun  that  had  given  some  warmth  to  the 
early  hours  of  the  afternoon  was  dimmed,  later, 
by  an  overcasting  of  thin  clouds,  and  the  rest  of 
the  time  was  passed  in-doors.  George  smoked  a 
friendly  cigar  with  Bradley  in  the  dining-room, 
and  after  Mrs.  Bradley  had  disappeared  for  a 
short  nap  he  whiled  away  the  remaining  hours 
with  Jessie  in  the  parlor.  They  sat  in  two  easy- 
chairs  on  opposite  sides  of  the  fireplace,  in  which 
a  handful  of  coal  was  working  against  the  last 
lingering  chill  of  winter.  The  girl  had  partly  re 
covered  her  earlier  tone,  and  she  chatted  with 
him  in  a  string  of  smart  jocularities  with  the 
manner  which  sometimes  assures  a  doubtful  call 
er  that  he  has  not  made  a  mistake  in  coming  and 
that  he  has  not  remained  too  long  after  coming. 
But  between  these  uptilted  strata  of  facetious- 
ness  there  came  now  and  then  a  layer  of  greater 
seriousness,  and  in  one  of  these  intervals  she 
trenched  on  the  domestic  affairs  of  the  Brainards. 

"Poor  Mayme  went  South  the  other  day, 
didn't  she  ?  I  hardly  suppose  you  could  call  it  a 
visit?"  She  looked  at  him  soberly,  with  her  eye 
brows  slightly  raised. 


183 


George  winced.  "  To  visit  her  uncle's  family," 
he  answered.  He  half  wondered  why  he  reiter 
ated  her  word  and  even  emphasized  it. 

"  Her  sister  was  going  to  run  down  there  with 
her." 

"  I  heard  so." 

"  You  see  Abbie  occasionally  ?" 

"  Occasionally." 

"  I  suppose  she  is  at  the  bank  a  good  deal  ?" 

"Not  often."  He  fixed  his  eye  on  the  last 
flickerings  of  the  coals  and  lapsed  into  silence. 
It  wras  not  so  easy  now  as  once  before  to  discuss 
Abbie  Brainard  with  Jessie  Bradley. 

Mrs.  Bradley  came  in  brisk  and  refreshed 
about  half  an  hour  before  train -time.  The 
young  people  were  chatting  amusedly  enough 
on  indifferent  subjects,  and  she  urged  Ogden  to 
stay  to  tea  with  the  clinging  insistency  of  the 
suburban  housekeeper. 

"  You  can  go  home  by  moonlight ;  I've  ar 
ranged  it  all  for  you."  She  drew  aside  a  win 
dow  curtain  and  showed  him  a  pale  white  disk 
in  a  bluish  sky. 

"  It's  full,  you  see.  We  just  have  cold  meat 
and  tea  and  biscuits — I  don't  want  to  keep  you 
under  false  pretences." 

The  moon  kept  faith  with  his  hostess ; — light 
ing  him  to  the  station  and  following  him  in  to 
town  and  keeping  him  in  sight  through  a  mile  of 
noisy  and  glaring  streets.  From  the  car-window, 


1S4 


now  and  then,  as  the  train  passed  back  through 
a  string  of  scattered  suburbs  and  crossed  the  flat 
reaches  of  prairie-land  between  he  was  conscious 
of  her  bland  insipidity ;  and  as  he  traversed  the 
down-town  business  district  she  raked  the  long 
parallels  of  the  east-and-west  streets  with  an  un- 
discriminating  indifference  that  a  mind  less  pre 
occupied  might  have  found  irritating.  It  was 
all  the  same  to  that  big,  foolish  face — town  and 
country  were  one.  It  had  its  vacuous  smile  for 
trees  and  fields,  and  it  had  the  same  smile  for 
the  variant  lights  of  the  street  -  cars,  for  the 
clamorous  cab-drivers  around  the  depots,  for  the 
flaring  jewelled  guide-posts  of  the  theatres,  for 
the  gaudy  fronts  of  sample-rooms,  for  the  cheap 
dishevelment  of  occasional  strayed  revellers,  for 
the  signs  of  chiropodists  and  the  swinging  shin 
gles  of  justices  of  the  peace,  and  for  a  certain 
meditative  young  man,  whether  he  was  travers 
ing  the  rustic  roads  of  Hinsdale  or  the  sophisti 
cated  planks  of  the  State  Street  Bridge.  Ogden's 
thoughts  flowed  along  with  a  quiet  and  grateful 
sense  of  the  friendliness  of  the  Bradleys,  and 
with  many  a  ripple,  wave,  and  eddy  to  corre 
spond  with  the  changing  moods  of  their  daugh 
ter.  He  made  a  careful  rehearsal  of  some  of 
their  bits  of  talk — why  had  she  said  this  ?  what 
had  she  meant  by  that  ?  why  had  she  done  the 
other  ?  He  dwelt  on  these  matters  with  an  ab 
sorbed  speculation,  and  with  a  young  man  of 


185 


Ogden's  temperament  speculation  was  but  the 
first  step  on  the  way  to  love. 

The  spring  trailed  along  slowly,  with  all  its 
discomforts  of  latitude  and  locality,  and  then 
came  the  long,  fresh  evenings  of  early  June, 
when  domesticity  brings  out  its  rugs  and  drug 
gets,  and  invites  its  friends  and  neighbors  to  sit 
with  it  on  its  front  steps.  The  Brainards  had 
these  appendages  to  local  housekeeping — linger 
ing  reminders  of  a  quick  growth  from  village  to 
city.  Theirs  was  a  large  rug  made  of  two 
breadths  of  Brussels  carpeting  and  surrounded 
on  all  four  sides  with  a  narrow  border  of  pink 
and  blue  flowers  on  a  moss-colored  background. 
This  rug  covered  the  greater  part  of  the  long 
flight  of  lime-stone  steps.  In  the  beautiful  cool 
ness  of  these  fresh  June  evenings  Abbie  fre 
quently  sat  there  on  the  topmost  step,  under  the 
jig-saw  lace-work  of  the  balcony-like  canopy  over 
the  front  door,  while  her  mother  occupied  a  car 
pet  camp-chair  within  the  vestibule  and  lan 
guidly  allowed  the  long  twilight  to  overtake  her 
neglected  chess-board.  They  sat  out,  now,  only 
after  dark.  Ogden  called  at  intervals,  and  was 
not  flattered  that  the  poor  girl  brightened  at  his 
coming ;  it  seemed  as  if  she  must  brighten  at  the 
coming  of  almost  anybody. 

One  evening  he  elected  to  tell  off  their  long 
street  on  foot  —  the  street  whose  ornamental 
lamp-posts  and  infrequent  spindling  elms  had 


186 


partly  decided  him  in  the  selection  of  his  first 
quarters.  "When  within  a  few  streets  of  the 
Brainard  corner  he  passed  a  house  (one  of  a  long 
row)  on  whose  front  steps  (as  with  its  neighbors, 
right  and  left)  were  camped  a  large  and  merry 
party,  whose  exaggerated  domesticity  made  it 
plain  that  they  were  all  fellow-boarders.  They 
occupied  two  rugs  as  well  as  two  chairs  and  a 
foot-stool  at  the  head  of  the  steps.  Through 
their  light-minded  hubbub  came  dominatingly  a 
voice  which  Ogden  recognized,  and  he  threw  up 
his  head  to  meet  the  frank  but  overdone  bow  of 
Cornelia  McNabb.  Beside  Cornelia  sat  a  young 
man  who  bowed  at  the  same  time  with  a  some 
what  forced  and  conscious  smile.  It  was  Burton 
Brainard. 

Cornelia  had  returned  to  the  neighborhood  of 
her  early  trials.  She  considered  herself  now  on 
a  distinctly  fashionable  street;  she  put  "Wash 
ington  Boulevard"  on  her  cards,  and  thought  her 
eight  dollars  a  week  was  none  too  much.  She 
had  had  a  plate  engraved  and  a  hundred  cards 
printed.  She  had  not  found  it  easy  to  dispose 
of  many  of  them ;  sometimes  she  gave  them  in 
shops,  when  she  was  asked  to  what  address  the 
goods  were  to  be  sent. 

"  But  just  wait  till  I  order  my  next  plate !" 
she  would  say  to  herself. 

She  had  left  one  of  her  cards  with  Mrs.  Gore. 
The  poor,  good  soul  (come  in  from  her  baking) 


187 


was  quite  taken  aback.  Then  Cornelia,  con 
scious  of  too  stiff  an  application  of  the  social 
code,  kissed  her  on  coming  away  and  made  her 
self  more  intelligible. 

"  Yes,"  Abbie  was  saying  to  Ogden,  a  few 
minutes  later,  "  Cornelia  is  a  pretty  smart  girl. 
Father  has  come  to  be  quite  taken  with  her." 

He  noticed  that  she  said — Cornelia. 

"  She  takes  down  some  of  his  letters,  now, 
too,"  she  continued.  "  /  never  learned,"  she 
added,  in  a  tone  of  slight  self-reproach. 

"  Good  Peter !"  exclaimed  Ogden,  with  a  pro 
testing  admiration,  "you  can  do  almost  every 
thing  else !" 

She  waved  aside  this  ardent  apology,  and 
looked  rather  shyly  through  the  rusty  iron-work 
of  the  hand-rail.  The  syringas  were  in  blossom  ; 
the  asphalt  path  had  stopped  its  afternoon's  run 
ning  and  had  solidified  since  sundown. 

"  I  think  he  likes  her  because  she  isn't  afraid 
of  him.  Neither  are  you,"  she  added,  in  a  low 
tone,  as  if  on  an  after-thought.  She  did  not  look 
his  way. 

Ogden  appreciated  this  appreciation  of  his 
behavior.  He  had  always  been  prompt  and 
respectful  with  Brainard,  but  he  had  never 
knuckled  down. 

"  He  gives  her  letters  almost  every  day.  She 
corrects  his  mistakes." 

"  And  he  corrects  hers  ?" 


188 


"  He  says  she  doesn't  make  many.  When  she 
does  she  sticks  it  out.  She  talks  back.  That's 
where  she's  bright.  It  kind  of  irritates  him,  I 
think,  to  have  his  —  his  clerks  —  his  employes 
seem  afraid.  It  pleases  him,  though,  when  other 
business  men  are." 

This  piece  of  filial  analysis  fell  softly  and 
slowly  on  the  thickening  darkness.  The  lamp 
lighter  was  zigzagging  across  the  wide  roadway 
with  his  kerosene  torch,  and  the  voices  of  talk 
ative  neighbors  on  the  other  side  of  the  street 
were  brought  over  by  the  breeze  along  with  the 
fumes  of  burning  oil. 

Ogden  was  pleased  with  this  touch  of  gilding 
that  the  daughter's  devotion  applied  to  the  fa 
ther's  clay.  Perhaps  the  old  man  was  not  hope 
lessly  beyond  the  reach  of  idealization's  hand, 
after  all. 

Besides  the  people  on  other  steps  around,  many 
clattered  by  over  the  asphalt  pavement,  and 
others  promenaded  slowly  along  the  sidewalk. 
These  moved  in  couples  towards  the  Park,  whose 
scant  clumps  of  citified  foliage  appeared  a  few 
hundred  yards  away  under  the  light  of  a  waning 
moon  and  a  half-bemisted  sprinkling  of  stars ; 
many  of  them  issued  from  basement  doors. 

Presently  another  couple  came  sauntering 
along,  and  they  paused  at  the  foot  of  the  Brain- 
ard  steps.  They  were  Burt  and  Cornelia.  Cor 
nelia  came  up  and  found  a  place  on  the  rug  that 


189 

suited  her,  and  greeted  Mrs.  Brainard  in  a  fa 
miliar  and  masterful  manner,  before  which  the 
good  woman  soon  boxed  up  her  chessmen  and 
retired.  Cornelia  then  turned  on  Ogden. 

"Stiff— or  bashful?" 

"  H'm  ?" 

"  Why  didn't  you  stop  and  say  a  word  as  you 
passed  by?" 

"  Oh !     Yes,  bashful ;  too  many  people." 

"  Too  bad  about  you  !"  She  turned  to  Burton. 
He  had  seated  himself  on  a  lower  step  with  his 
back  to  the  others.  His  hat  was  on  the  back  of 
his  head  and  his  chin  was  propped  up  by  his 
knees  and  elbows.  He  was  looking  thoughtfully 
at  the  curbstone.  "  Come  up  and  be  sociable," 
she  called.  , 

Burt  rose  and  ascended  a  step  or  two. 

"  Oh,  how  are  you,  Ogden  ?"  he  said  rather 
absently.  George  felt  that  he  should  have  said 
more,  and  said  it  sooner  and  said  it  differently. 

Cornelia  passed  a  cushion  down  to  Burt. 
"  There  ;  take  that  and  be  comfortable."  She 
regarded  him  studiously.  It  was  dark,  but  he 
was  all  there — the  short,  thick,  yellow  mous 
tache,  the  virile  chin  lately  shaved  and  pow 
dered,  the  dense  hair  that  rose  in  a  level  line 
from  the  top  of  his  forehead.  Cornelia  would 
have  seen  all  these  things  in  darkness  that  was 
Egyptian.  She  felt  her  fingers  working  towards 
them. 


190 


Cornelia  was  dressed  with  a  trim  and  sub 
dued  modishness.  She  had  taken  a  good  many 
cues  from  Mrs.  Floyd,  and  she  had  not  been 
above  cultivating  an  intimacy  with  a  girl  who 
worked  for  the  excessively  dear  and  fashion 
able  house  that  dressed  Mrs.  Ingles.  Mrs.  Floyd 
had  had  no  need  to  teach  Cornelia  anything 
about  grammar,  but  she  had  shown  her,  all  un 
consciously,  the  advantage  of  a  regulated  use  of 
slang. 

Her  fingers,  debarred  by  the  cold  conventions 
of  society  from  any  entanglement  in  the  head  of 
hair  just  before  her,  smoothed  and  patted  the 
folds  in  her  own  skirt.  She  further  relieved  her 
self  by  a  high,  sniffling  toss  of  the  head  and  a 
long,  deep  respiration. 

"  Well,  isn't  this  a  great  night !"  she  said,  ad 
dressing  the  little  party  generally.  "  Isn't  the  air 
splendid !  I  declare,  I  could  just  ramble  about 
till  morning.  And  yet  I  suppose  your  moth 
er  " — to  Abbie — "  has  checkmated  herself  and 
gone  to  bed.  Dear  me,  if  there  wasn't  any  city, 
and  no  clatter-clatter  on  that  machine !  Seems 
as  if  I  must  just  make  a  break  for  the  country 
before  long — just  get  up  home  and  hop  into  my 
little  boat  and  paddle  all  around  that  whole 
blessed  lake !" 

"  Why  don't  you  ?"  asked  Ogden.  "  Can't  you 
give  yourself  a  vacation  ?"  He  spoke  a  little 
wistfully ;  there  was  none  ahead  for  him  —  no 


191 


Underground  man  ever  had  an  outing  during  his 
first  year. 

"  I  don't  see  how.  They  say  you  can't  serve 
two  masters.  Well,  I've  got  five — four  too  many. 
At  least,"  she  tacked  on,  as  if  a  closer  calculation 
would  further  increase  the  number  of  these  su 
perfluities.  "  Can  I  go  all  over  the  building  and 
tell  each  one  of  them  that  my  services  are  going 
to  be  demanded  exclusively  for  several  days  by 
some  other  one  of  them  ?  Or  shall  I  be  sick — 
just  for  a  day,  at  first,  and  keep  adding  days, 
one  at  a  time,  until  I've  had  a  week  ?  I  don't 
know  what  to  do." 

"  Drop  the  whole  business,"  said  Burt  brusque 
ly,  without  turning  about. 

"  And  leave  all  my  poor  people  in  the  lurch  ?" 
she  cried,  as  if  her  employers  were  her  most 
poignant  concern. 

"  They  can  get  somebody  else." 

"  Oh,  yes !"  cried  Cornelia,  with  mock  humil 
ity  ;  "  I'm  nobody ;  I  can  be  easily  replaced." 
She  cast  her  humility  aside  lightly.  "  I'll  tell 
you  what  I  would  do,  though,  if  I  was  up  at 
Pewaukee  this  eve.  I'd  paddle  down  to  Lake 
side  and  back — by  the  light  of  that  moon."  She 
pointed  down  the  street  towards  the  park  foli 
age.  "  The  moon  that  gilds  those  fruit-tree  tops 
—Shakespeare.  And  it  would  be  a  good  deal 
brighter  up  there  than  it  is  in  this  smoky  old 
place." 


192 


"  Can  you  row  ?"  asked  Ogden. 

"  Can  I  ?  I  guess.  Pair  of  oars  made  to  or 
der  ;  and  I  can  feather  with  'em,  too.  Speaking 
of  Lakeside,  I  know  who's  going  to  be  there  the 
last  of  this  month;  that  Miss  Bradley  —  Mrs. 
Floyd's  niece." 

"  Cousin,"  corrected  George. 

"  Is  it  ?  Cousin,  then.  She's  a  lively  girl ;  she 
and  I  would  make  a  pair.  Only  she  don't  look 
very  strong." 

"  I  thought,"  said  he,  "  that  she  was  going  to 
Ocon — Ocon — " 

Cornelia  gave  an  encouraging  ha,  ha.  "  That's 
right !  Take  time  and  you'll  get  it.  Now,  then ; 
Ocono— " 

"  Ocono—" 

"  Mowoc." 

"  Mowoc." 

"  Oconomowoc ;  easy  enough  when  you  have 
it.  Accent  on  second  syllable.  The  only  trouble 
is  when  you  write  it ;  you  never  know  where 
to  stop.  Well,  so  she  is  going  to  Oconomowoc, 
later  —  to  stay  through  July.  They're  only 
twelve  miles  apart." 

"  You  know  Miss  Bradley,  then  ?"  Abbie 
asked  Ogden.  "  She  was  over  here  once  or 
twice,  to  see — Mayme.  She  seemed  like  a  real 
nice  girl." 

Ogden  bowed  assent.  He  found  himself  as 
unwilling  to  discuss  Jessie  Bradley  with  Abbie 


193 


Brainard  as  he  had  been  to  discuss  Abbie  Brain- 
ard  with  Jessie  Bradley.  Whenever  he  debated 
them  it  was  a  silent  debate,  in  which  he  himself 
took  both  sides. 

"  She's  a  high-stepper,"  volunteered  Cornelia, 
filling  in  Ogden's  silence.  "  Good  deal  of  style, 
too.  Yet  they  say  her  father  isn't  so  extra  well 
off.  She's  a  great  contriver,  I  expect.  Well, 
gumption  goes  a  long  ways  ;  it's  wriggled  me  off 
my  back  a  good  many  times."  She  turned  to 
Burt.  "  Now  then,  young  man,  do  you  want  to 
walk  me  along  to  the  park  ?  Haven't  we  roosted 
about  long  enough  ?" 

"  All  right,"  said  he,  getting  up  promptly. 
He  seemed  to  be  smiling  appreciatively  at  her 
pertness. 

"Ta!"  cried  Cornelia,  dabbing  her  hand  to 
Ogden  and  Abbie  ;  and  off  she  went.  "  Perhaps 
you'll  see  us  later — if  you're  good !" 

A  big,  bulky  figure  came  stamping  along  the 
walk,  and  reached  the  foot  of  the  steps  just  as 
Burt  and  Cornelia  started  off. 

"  I  guess  they'll  be  good,"  a  heavy  voice 
said.  The  voice  was  not  greatly  disguised  by 
its  assumption  of  unaccustomed  jocularity,  and 
George  with  a  flush  recognized  it  as  Brainard's. 

"Well,  Abbie,"  he  said,  lumbering  up  the 
steps.  And,  "  How  are  you,  Ogden  ?"  he  said  to 
George,  as  he  passed  on  and  seated  himself  with 
a  loud  grunt  on  his  wife's  chair. 

13 


194 


George  bit  his  lip ;  the  old  man  had  no  busi 
ness  to  misuse  other  people's  pronouns  in  that 
way.  Cornelia's  "you"  might  have  meant  one 
person— if  it  meant  more  than  one  still  it  might 
have  meant  them  separately ;  but  Brainard's 
perverting  "they"  bracketed  him  and  his  com 
panion  in  a  fashion  utterly  unwarranted. 

Brainard  lingered  a  few  moments  above  their 
heads.  He  made  one  or  two  clumsy  attempts  at 
facetiousness,  and  George  surmised  that  this  was 
his  way  of  showing  a  friendliness.  But  his  jok 
ing  was  much  more  painful  than  any  hectoring 
could  have  been,  and  George  was  greatly  re 
lieved  when  he  presently  rose  and  retired  un 
ceremoniously  into  the  house. 


XY 

AFTER  Brainard's  withdrawal  Abbie  and  Og- 
den  sat  for  some  time  in  silence.  The  moon 
sank ;  the  clatter  of  hoofs  on  the  asphalt  sounded 
less  frequently ;  some  of  the  neighbors  over  the 
way  had  pulled  in  their  rugs,  and  were  now  seen, 
by  new-lighted  gas-jets,  at  upper  windows  pull 
ing  down  their  shades.  The  breeze  freshened ; 
it  rustled  the  lilacs  and  syringas  in  the  side  yard, 
and  it  swayed  the  stringy  mass  of  wild  cucum 
bers  that  had  taken  it  upon  themselves  to  hide 
the  red  hideousness  of  the  barn. 

Suddenly  Ogden  spoke. 

"  There !  I  knew  I  should  forget  it,  and  I 
have.  I  laid  it  on  my  bureau  the  last  thing,  too !" 

"What?" 

"  Why— <A  False  Start.'  You  haven't  wanted 
it,  have  you  ?" 

"  No ;  keep  it  if  you  like.    I've  read  it." 

She  meant,  "Keep  it;  please  do.  Keep  it, 
for  my  sake." 

"  It's  a  pretty  good  book ;  didn't  you  think 
so?"  he  asked. 

"Yes;  I  liked  it  ever  so  much.  He  married 
the  right  one,  after  all,  didn't  he  ?" 


190 


"Might  have  done  it  before,"  Ogden  com 
mented.  "  No  earthly  reason  why  not.  Only 
you  know  how  they  spin  these  things  out." 

There  was  a  sudden  shutting  down  of  windows 
over  their  heads.  Ogden  drew  out  his  watch, 
and  turned  it  so  as  to  profit  by  the  lamp-post  on 
the  corner.  "  Why,  I'd  no  idea !"  Burt  and 
Cornelia  had  not  returned  from  the  park,  or,  if 
so,  had  passed  on  the  other  side  of  the  street. 
"  Good-night." 

"  It  isn't  late,  is  it?" 

"  Only  for  a  North- sider." 

"Good-night,"  she  said,  slowly,  and  sat  alone 
on  the  steps  until  her  father  came  down  and 
called  her  in. 

On  the  first  of  July  Brainard  summoned 
George  into  his  own  private  room. 

"  We  have  about  decided  to  have  an  assistant 
cashier  here,"  he  said.  His  voice  was  gruff,  but 
his  glance  was  a  little  sheepish.  "  Mr.  Fairchild 
thinks  it  will  be  convenient  about  signatures 
and  a  good  many  other  things.  Burt's  out  a 
good  deal  and  likely  to  be  off  all  through  Au 
gust,  and  I  don't  like  to  have  drafts  signed  in  ad 
vance.  You  could  make  up  the  reports,  too,  and 
swear  to 'em.  Besides,  it's  elective  —  puts  you 
in  the  Bankers'  Almanac,  for  one  thing.  As  to 
salary,  I  suppose  we  could  stand  an  extra  five 
hundred — or  six." 

He  looked  at  George  with  some  constraint, 
but  his  intention  appeared  to  be  friendly. 


197 

"  We  might  expect  you  to  go  on  helping  with 
the  tellers'  work  on  occasion — vacation-time,  for 
instance.  Now,  about  your  own  vacation- 
George  bowed  with  an  additional  acknowledg 
ment  of  the  favor ;  he  had  expected  to  pass  an 
unbroken  summer  in  town. 

"  Thursday's  the  Fourth.  Put  five  or  six  days 
with  it,  if  you  like — to  get  accustomed  to  the 
new  deal." 

He  turned  to  his  desk.  " That's  all  right; 
talk  to  Fairchild."  It  seemed  that  anything 
beyond  the  merest  word  of  thanks  would  be  dis 
tasteful,  and  George  withdrew. 

He  accepted  his  elevation  and  his  vacation 
with  unfeigned  pleasure;  he  attributed  his  ad 
vance  to  the  old  man's  softened  mood  occasioned 
by  his  son's  engagement  to  Cornelia  McNabb. 
Burt,  a  few  mornings  back,  had  told  his  father, 
plainly  and  promptly,  that  it  was  his  intention 
to  marry  Cornelia — and  soon.  He  had  prepared 
himself  for  remonstrance — even  for  opposition, 
and  he  had  braced  himself  to  demonstrate  to  his 
father  that  he  was  going  to  have  his  own  way. 
The  old  man,  however,  made  no  difficulties  ; 
Cornelia  had  certain  qualities  that  he  appre 
ciated,  and  he  knew  that  Burt  had  a  strong  and 
a  strengthening  will.  Besides,  a  son-in-law  was 
one  thing,  and  a  daughter-in-law  another.  A 
daughter's  husband  must  come  as  an  ally,  offen 
sive  and  defensive  ;  he  must  contribute  money, 


198 


and  if  not  money,  then  abilities.  There  must  be 
abilities  in  actual  exercise,  or  there  must  be  the 
certain  promise  of  their  development  in  the  pur 
suit  of  some  such  career  as  would  be  recognized 
and  endorsed  by  business  men  of  his  own  sort. 
That  ten-dollar-a-week  man — that  anthem  sing 
er!  His  fist  clenched  and  his  eye  glared  at  the 
very  thought  of  him.  But  a  son's  wife  could  be 
moulded — if  not  moulded,  then  coerced.  There 
was  to  be  no  breaking  away  from  two  such  wills 
as  his  and  Burt's.  He  liked  vim  ;  he  recognized 
snap ;  he  was  prepared  to  welcome  Cornelia  as  a 
vital  force. 

"  Oconomowoc,"  murmured  George  to  him 
self.  He  was  bending  over  his  bureau  drawer, 
sorting  out  his  collars.  The  gas-flame  reflected 
itself  in  the  mirror  and  threw  a  doubled  glare 
upon  his  face. 

"  Eh !"  said  Brower,  sitting  cross-legged  on 
his  trunk.  He  laid  the  book  down  across  two 
of  the  top  slats;  it  was  "David  Grieve" — he 
read  everything. 

They  were  still  in  the  Rush  Street  house.  Mrs. 
Ogden  had  a  room  on  the  floor  below. 

"Did  I  speak?"  asked  George. 

"  You  said — Oconomowoc.  Is  that  where  you 
are  going  ?" 

"  Queer  name,  isn't  it  ?   What's  the  place  like  ?" 

"  If  you've  got  a  chance  to  go  there,  you  go." 
The  oracle  spoke  and  retired  into  his  book. 


199 


George  went.  The  train  made  its  rapid  run 
up  to  Milwaukee,  took  its  short  stop,  and  turned 
westward  on  its  way  towards  La  Crosse.  At 
Pewaukee  there  was  the  usual  halt ;  it  length 
ened  to  an  unusual  halt.  George  paced  the 
long  platform  impatiently ;  his  mind  had  pro 
jected  itself  through  Nagowicka  and  ISTashotah 
and  Okauchee  to  Oconomowoc,  and  his  body  was 
eager  to  follow. 

"  What's  the  trouble  ?"  he  asked  the  brakeman. 

"  St.  Paul  express  late — passes  us  here." 

The  platform  was  swarming  with  passengers 
and  townspeople.  A  figure  rushed  through  the 
crowd  and  grasped  George  by  the  hand. 

"  So  you're  gallivanting,  too  ?  And  I'll  bet  a 
nickel  you've  been  aboard  all  the  Avay  up— par 
lor-car.  Now,  haven't  you?"  The  voice  sound 
ed  a  trumpet-note  of  wide-flung  triumph.  It  was 
Cornelia's. 

Her  cheeks  blazed  and  her  eyes  burned  with 
the  magnificence  of  conscious  conquest.  Her 
glory  spread  about  her  the  same  succession  of 
flowing  circles  that  a  stone  spreads  over  a  pond. 
It  seemed  as  if  her  expansiveness  must  crowd 
the  train  from  its  track  and  the  station  from  its 
foundations. 

"  Ma,"  she  called  back  into  the  crowd,  "  come 
here — do  !  I  want  you  to  meet  Mr.  Ogden.  He's 
one  of  my  most  particular  friends  ;  but  I  guess 
you  don't  need  to  be  told  that  —  you've  heard 


200 


enough  about  him.  Mr.  Ogden,  this  is  my  moth 
er,  and  she's  about  the  best  mother  that  ever 
lived." 

Mrs.  McNabb  smiled  bravely  and  took  Ogden's 
slender  palm  in  her  large,  capable  grasp.  She 
wore  a  sedate  black  bonnet ;  her  gray  hair  was 
parted  in  the  middle  and  fell  right  and  left  in 
two  wide,  crinkly  folds. 

"And  I  want  pa  to  come,  too;  no  dodging." 
An  elderly  man  came  forward  reluctantly,  in  his 
loose,  short  trousers  and  his  thick  boots  with 
broad,  square  toes;  he  seemed  to  find  Ogden,  in 
his  modified  tourist  guise,  a  disconcerting  object. 
He  lifted  up  his  shrewd  but  retiring  eyes,  placing 
one  embarrassed  hand  on  his  grizzled  chin  whis 
kers  and  giving  George  the  other ;  it  was  rough, 
and  the  nails  were  broken. 

George  shook  hands  with  the  old  fellow — who 
went  well  enough  with  other  features  of  the  Wis 
consin  landscape :  the  shaggy  tamarack  swamps, 
the  gashed  sides  of  gravelly  "hog-backs,"  the 
long  stretches  of  disordered  barbed -wire  fences, 
the  rusty  reds  of  depots  and  storehouses,  and  the 
marshy  ponds,  edged  by  the  ragged  scantlings 
of  gigantic  ice-houses. 

Cornelia  did  not  perceive  this  harmony — or 
ignored  it. 

"Yes,"  she  declared,  "ma's  the  best  ma,  and 
pa  ain't  far  behind.  Now  don't  shy,  pa ;  Mr. 
Ogden  is  more  scary  than  you  are.  He'd  been 


201 


trying  for  near  three  months  to  ask  me  to  go  to 
the  theatre  with  him,  when  along  came  Burt  and 
plumped  out  and  asked  me  inside  of  a  week. 
Burt's  enterprising ;  no  mistake." 

The  old  people  smiled  at  each  other,  half  em 
barrassed  by  Cornelia's  frankness. 

"  But  we  won't  shut  out  George — oh,  dear !  I 
mean  Mr.  Ogden  —  altogether.  Bear  witness, 
both  of  you :  I  ask  him  to  be  one  of  my  ushers." 

George  stared.  Was  the  girl  meaning  to  be 
married  in  church  after — everything  ?  Then  he 
bowed.  "  On  Abbie's  account — if  at  all,"  he 
thought. 

"  Going  to  Coonie  for  the  Fourth,  I  suppose  ?" 
Cornelia  continued. 

"  Coonie  ?" 

"  Oh,  well — 'Con'm'woc,  if  you  must  have  it 
all.  Well,  we're  on  the  move,  too.  Good-by. 
But" — meaningly — "you'll  find  us  all  again  in 
town  pretty  soon;  and  if  pa  and  ma  don't  see 
the  whole  place  from  the  tip-top  of  the  Clifton, 
my  name  is  McMucld.  On  a  clear  day,  too— 
when  you  can  tell  where  the  smoke  ends  and  the 
land  begins.  Good-by.  Our  house  is  on  the 
right,  a  mile  farther;  watch  out  for  it." 

Oconomowoc,  from  Ogden's  point  of  view,  ap 
peared  as  one  wide  street  running  between  two 
small  lakes  that  were  only  a  few  hundred  feet 
asunder.  The  business  part  of  the  street  was 
built  neatly  and  compactly  of  the  cream-colored 


202 


brick  of  Milwaukee,  and  the  rest  of  it  was  a 
thickly  shaded  stretch  bordered  with  a  double 
string  of  summer  cottages,  which  fronted  on  the 
street  and  backed  on  the  water.  In  the  midst  of 
the  cottages  stood  a  big  hotel  of  yellow  brick ; 
it  was  faced  with  a  lofty  row  of  seven  immense 
white  columns,  and  above  the  maples  before  it 
there  rose  a  steep  roof  set  with  a  series  of  dor 
mer-windows.  George  was  given  a  room  which 
one  of  these  dormers  lighted,  and  presently 
stepped  down  the  street  to  inquire  at  one  of  the 
cottages  for  Jessie  Bradley.  He  soon  stepped 
back  again  ;  she  was  not  expected  for  two  days 
yet.  He  thanked  Brainard  again  for  his  full 
week,  and  threw  himself  into  one  of  the  chairs 
under  the  big  colonnade. 

The  town  was  at  the  beginning  of  its  annual 
patriotic  flurry ;  after  the  Fourth  it  settles  down, 
and  the  real  season  begins  a  week  or  two  later. 
A  good  many  young  people  were  scurrying 
about,  many  of  them  in  aquatic  attire ;  those 
who  did  not  carry  rackets  carried  banjos.  No 
body  noticed  him  except  the  young  wife  of  the 
proprietor.  She  stood  in  the  doorway ;  her  black 
eyebrows  were  contracted  in  a  study  of  him.  She 
wore  her  raven  hair  in  a  Japanesque  fashion,  but 
she  corrected  the  plump  dumpiness  of  the  Japa 
nese  maiden  by  a  tall  and  slender  grace  of  her 
own.  "  He's  all  right,"  she  said  to  herself,  and 
sank  down  in  a  chair  beside  him. 


203 


"  You  poor,  lonesome  man,"  she  began,  with  a 
graceful  audacity  that  was  her  peculiar  posses 
sion,  "  let  me  talk  to  you." 

"Do,"  answered  George,  smilingly.  He  seemed 
to  have  known  her  a  week. 

"  That  is,  if  you're  not  just  married  or  not  just 
going  to  be.  Are  you  ?" 

«  N_ no." 

"  We  see  so  much  of  that  sort  of  thing.  May 
is  dreadful;  this  year  we  had  five  couples  in  a 
week — it's  so  pleasant  and  quiet  here  then.  The 
fifth  was  from.  Detroit ;  they  stayed  quite  a  while, 
and  when  they  went  away  they  thanked  us  all 
over.  We  hadn't  done  a  thing  for  them — we 
simply  left  them  alone  and  let  them  go  about. 
But  they  were  just  chuck  full  of  it — they'd  have 
been  in  glory  anywhere.  What  do  you  think  of 
our  columns  ?" 

Two  men  could  hardly  have  spanned  their 
fluted  shafts.  George  cast  his  eye  up  to  their 
capitals,  on  a  level  with  the  third-story  windows. 
"  They're  great." 

"  Aren't  they  ?  They've  only  been  on  two  or 
three  years.  We  call  them  the  Seven  Bride 
grooms." 

"  The  Seven  Bridegrooms  ?  Is  each  the  gift  of 
a  happy  man  ?" 

"Not  quite;  one  happy  man  gave  them  all. 
He  was  here  a  week ;  he  gave  us  one  every  day. 
Think  how  happy  he  must  have  been." 


204 


She  smiled  at  his  inquiring  glance. 

"  He  wanted  things  his  own  way,  and  could 
afford  it,"  she  said.  "  His  name  was  Ingles." 

Ogden  did  some  lounging  up  and  down  the 
street.  He  crossed  a  bridge  where  one  lake  fell 
into  the  other  over  a  mill-dam,  and  found  him 
self  in  another  cluster  of  cottages.  They  stood 
on  a  bluff  and  looked  down  the  three  miles  of 
the  lower  lake.  Both  shores  were  diversified  by 
promontories  and  islands,  and  the  red  roofs  of 
other  cottages  showed  everywhere  over  the  tuft 
ed  foliage  of  the  shores. 

"  How  it  balances — how  it  composes !"  he  said 
of  the  view,  as  he  recrossed  the  bridge.  "  And 
how  it's  kept!"  he  said  of  the  town,  as  he  re 
traced  his  steps  to  the  hotel.  "Really  "—with 
unconscious  patronage  —  "it's  the  only  thing 
West,  so  far,  that  has  tone  and  finish." 

He  took  a  boat.  The  next  day,  the  same.  The 
town  was  full,  but  was  lying  back  quietly  for  the 
excitement  of  the  morrow  ;  he  had  the  water 
almost  to  himself. 

Sloops  and  cat-boats  were  being  rigged  for  a 
coming  regatta.  A  scow  for  fireworks  was  be 
ing  anchored  two  or  three  hundred  yards  from 
shore.  He  paddled  about  with  a  trolling-line. 
But  the  line  was  neglected.  He  had  a  good 
deal  to  think  about ;  here  was  place  and  time 
to  do  it. 

His  future  was  assured.    He  could  now  marry. 


205 


He  wanted  to  marry.  There  was  only  the  ques 
tion — which  ? 

He  had  surrendered  his  primitive  theory  that 
marriage  was  a  matter  which  concerned  only  the 
two  principals.  Kittie's  marriage  —  who  had 
come  to  be  more  deeply  concerned  in  it  than  he  ? 

He  thought  of  Abbie  Brainard,  and  he  thought 
of  her  family — a  divorced  sister  ;  a  disreputable 
brother,  whose  future  was  to  sound,  perhaps, 
depths  yet  undreamed  of ;  another  brother,  whose 
coming  marriage  was  but  conclusive  evidence  of 
the  coarseness  of  the  family  grain. 

And  the  father — his  scandalous  success  ;  his 
tainted  millions ;  his  name  a  byword.  Those 
bawlings  in  the  streets  ;  those  disgraceful  and 
degrading  pictures ;  the  stench  of  the  whole 
scandal. 

His  oars  dropped  idly,  and  he  sat  with  his 
eyes  fixed  on  the  bottom  of  the  boat. 

But  the  old  man  would  die.  Yes;  and  then 
would  come  the  division  of  the  spoil.  If  there 
had  been  so  much  trouble  in  a  poor  sixty  or 
eighty  thousand,  how  much  more  might  there 
be  in  all  these  millions?  If  he  had  found  such 
difficulty  in  getting  restitution  from  McDowell 
— a  restitution  so  incomplete  as  to  be  even  yet 
largely  in  the  future — what  might  there  be  to 
expect  from  other  brothers-in-law  and  from 
other  new  relations  that  so  much  money  would 
be  sure  to  bring  ? 


206 


He  ran  his  troubled  eyes  along  the  shore.  A 
party  of  children  were  wading  and  splashing  at 
the  foot  of  a  high,  wooded  point. 

That  money — those  millions !  It  was  the  talk 
of  the  bank  that  Burt,  on  his  wedding-day,  was 
to  have  five  hundred  thousand  dollars  as  an  out- 
and-out  gift.  And  if  Burt,  why  not  Abbie  —  in 
the  proper  degree?  Those  shameful,  indecent 
millions — millions  that  it  Avould  be  a  disgrace  to 
receive,  to  handle. 

"  Boat  ahoy !"  A  sloop  swept  by.  He  dodged 
its  bowsprit  and  was  tossed  by  its  wake.  He 
threw  out  his  oars  to  steady  himself. 

The  husband  of  a  rich  wife — another  Yalen- 
tine.  My  house — my  furniture ! 

Then,  he  had  meant  to  get  on — in  business,  in 
society.  Was  he  to  marry  a  recluse  ? — a  girl  in 
experienced  in  the  ways  of  his  world — perhaps 
incapable  of  adapting  herself  to  them  —  surely 
careless  of  them. 

Abbie  was  before  him  in  her  tender  and  stead 
fast  serenity,  in  her  stanch  and  genuine  capa 
bility.  He  set  his  teeth,  and  took  up  his  oars 
again,  and  rowed  half  a  mile  with  a  furious 
vigor.  He  stopped,  panting  and  exhausted,  in  a 
clump  of  reeds  off  a  sedgy  shore,  near  a  group  of 
linden-trees.  He  had  left  Abbie  behind. 

An  elderly  couple  were  standing  among  the 
rushes.  They  regarded  him  with  a  friendly  and 
companionable  smile.  They  seemed  to  offer  him 


207 


the  "middling  lot"  that  the  sage  and  poet  have 
called  the  best  and  safest.  "  No  hazardous  and 
complicated  relationships,"  they  seemed  to  say ; 
"  no  struggle  over  dead  men's  dollars,  no  swamp 
ing  of  self-respect  in  ill -got  gains;  only  our 
daughter — 

George  pressed  his  forehead  confusedly  and 
raised  his  eyes  to  get  his  bearings ;  the  late 
afternoon  sun  dazzled  him  with  its  level  beams. 
He  saw  a  house  set  high  among  the  trees ;  and 
on  its  porch,  amidst  a  tangle  of  bittersweet,  a 
girl  was  standing.  He  shaded  his  eyes ;  it  was 
as  if  she  waved  a  handkerchief  at  him.  Pres 
ently  she  strolled  to  the  brow  of  the  bank. 

"  Glad  to  see  you,"  she  called ;  "  we  have  just 
driven  over." 

It  was  Jessie  Bradley. 


XYI 

COENELIA  MaNABB  became  Mrs.  Burton  Brain- 
ard  during  the  first  week  in  August.  Neither  of 
the  pair  was  inclined  to  wait,  and  neither  had 
such  a  circle  of  friends  as  to  make  a  midsummer 
wedding  less  preferable  than  a  later  one. 

The  wedding  took  place  in  church — as  Cornelia 
had  intimated  to  Ogden.  She  was  not  disposed 
to  let  false  delicacy  clog  the  heels  of  success,  and 
she  had  her  way.  They  were  married  in  the 
daytime,  as  a  partial  concession  to  the  social  in 
experience  of  one  father  and  the  social  indiffer 
ence  of  the  other.  The  young  men  of  the  bank 
were  drawn  on  freely;  Ogden  served  as  an  usher 
— as  Cornelia  had  requested.  Adrian  Yalentine 
supported  Burt  at  the  chancel-rail,  and  gave  some 
friendly  counsel  as  to  details  at  both  church  and 
house. 

Cornelia's  circle  of  girl-friends  yielded  nothing 
suitable  in  the  way  of  bridesmaids;  but  there 
was  the  groom's  sister — and  one  maiden  attend 
ant  was  enough.  Abbie  therefore  took  this 
part  —  for  the  first  time.  She  walked  up  the 
long  aisle  with  a  bashful  modesty.  She  had  a 
dozen  opportunities  to  meet  Ogden's  eye,  but 


209 


her  embarrassed   shyness   prevented   her  from, 
once  looking  into  his  face. 

Mary  Brainard  was  still  in  exile,  and  her 
mother  was  confined  to  her  room  by  one  of  her 
nervous  attacks ;  but  in  one  of  the  back  pews, 
in  the  twilight  under  the  gallery,  a  dark,  meagre, 
and  dissolute-looking  young  man  had  taken  his 
post.  And  as  Burt,  with  a  proud  and  pros 
perous  smile,  led  Cornelia  down  the  aisle,  tears 
of  indignant  rage  started  from  the  eyes  of  his 
banned  and  mistreated  brother.- 

The  Brainard  marriage  was  celebrated  in 
print,  just  as  the  Brainard  divorce  had  been. 
Some  of  the  cuts  that  had  illustrated  the  one 
were  also  used  to  illustrate  the  other. 

Mr.  and  Mrs.  Burton  Brainard  went  to  Cali 
fornia  and  were  absent  a  month.  On  their  re 
turn  they  took  up  their  quarters  in  the  Brainard 
house,  while  Burt  considered  the  question  of 
building.  Cornelia  had  made  up  her  own  mind 
where  this  building  should  be  done. 

They  returned  to  town  in  accordance  with  the 
mandate  conveyed  by  certain  cards  that  had 
been  sent  out,  directed  by  the  serviceable  Abbie, 
during  their  absence.  These  cards  announced 
that  "Mr.  and  Mrs.  Burton  Tillinghast  Brain 
ard  "  would  be  "  at  home  "  on  the  "  Thursdays 
in  September.'' 

Cornelia  had  gloated  over  these  cards  on  their 
arrival  from  the  stationer's. 
U 


210 


"  Mrs.  Burton  Tillinghast  Brainard,"  she  read, 
with  a  vigorous  hitch  of  her  shoulder.  "  H'm  ! 
now  we're  ready  to  knock  out  your  Smiths  and 
your  Joneses."  She  tossed  her  head.  "  And 
then  bring  on  your  Floyds  and  your  Ingleses !" 

Before  going  away  she  had  wrung  Ogden's 
hand,  and  had  committed  her  parents  to  him 
during  the  concluding  days  of  their  stay.  Es 
pecially  was  he  enjoined  to  take  them  up  to  the 
top  of  the  Clifton  on  the  very  first  clear  day. 
A  clear  day  came  ;  he  conducted  them  up  to  the 
roof-observatory  and  showed  them  the  city,  and 
they  numbered  the  towers  thereof. 

The  old  people  tiptoed  gingerly  around  the 
parapet,  while  Ogden  waved  his  hand  over  the 
prospect  —  the  mouth  of  the  river  with  its  ele 
vators  and  its  sprawling  miles  of  railway  track ; 
the  weakish  blue  of  the  lake,  with  the  coming 
and  going  of  schooners  and  propellers,  and  the 
"cribs"  that  stood  on  the  faint  horizon — "that's 
where  our  water  comes  from,"  George  explained  ; 
the  tower  of  the  water-works  itself,  and  the  dull 
and  distant  green  of  Lincoln  Park ;  the  towering 
bulk  of  other  great  sky-scrapers  and  the  grimy 
spindling  of  a  thousand  surrounding  chimneys  ; 
the  lumber-laden  brigs  that  were  tugged  slowly 
through  the  drawbridges,  while  long  strings  of 
drays  and  buggies  and  street-cars  accumulated 
during  the  wait.  "  My !  don't  they  look  little !" 
cried  Mrs.  McNabb. 


211 


George  smiled  with  all  the  gratified  vanity  of 
a  native. 

"  And  that,"  he  said,  pointing  southward  down 
the  street,  ais  the  Board  of  Trade." 

"  Where  we  was  the  other  day,"  the  old  man  re 
minded  his  wife.  "  And  that  gilt  thing  on  the  top 
of  it  is  a  ship,  I  swan.  And  wasn't  they  noisy, 
though.  "Well,  now,  Josephine,  ain't  it  handsome?" 

A  simple  soul  found  to  admire  the  tower  of 
the  Board  of  Trade — let  it  be  put  on  record. 

George  and  McNabb  had  got  on  very  well. 
The  old  countryman  had  felt  rather  frost-bitten 
on  seeing  George  in  full  social  regalia,  but  seem 
ing  to  find  him  more  human  and  approachable 
in  a  simple  business  suit,  he  had  thawed  out 
again.  Mrs.  McNabb  had  taken  to  him  kindty 
from  the  start.  Most  women  did,  though  he  ap 
peared  never  to  have  observed  it.  She  joined 
with  her  husband  in  wreathing  him  in  an  at 
mosphere  of  simple  friendliness. 

The  other  father  concerned  in  the  festivities 
had  also  thawed  towards  George,  though  it 
would  be  a  mistake  to  attribute  simplicity  to 
any  friendliness  shown  by  the  head  of  the  Un 
derground.  At  one  stage  of  the  proceedings 
Erastus  M.  Brainard  had  laid  his  hand  on  Og- 
den's  shoulder,  and  the  young  man  had  asked 
himself  with  distressful  circumspection  what  it 
meant.  It  might  have  been  to  his  advantage  if 
he  had  found  an  answer. 


212 


George's  engagement  to  Jessie  Bradley  was 
now  an  accomplished  fact ;  the  nail  was  driven 
— only  a  formal  announcement  was  required  to 
clinch  it.  He  had  preferred  to  withhold  this  un 
til  his  affairs  with  McDowell  were  more  accu 
rately  adjusted.  Freeze  &  Freeze  had  put  on  a 
pretty  positive  pressure,  and  an  arrangement  had 
been  contrived  that  had  some  of  the  externals,  at 
least,  of  an  adjustment. 

McDowell's  affairs  had  not  been  taking  a  very 
favorable  turn;  some  of  his  ventures  had  been 
too  rank  for  even  gullibility  itself,  and  his  hope 
of  relations  with  Ingles  was  now  completely  at 
an  end.  Ingles,  in  fact,  had  signified  to  him 
that  an  accounting  for  of  the  St.  Asaph  funds 
was  desired  by  himself  and  the  other  contribut 
ing  members  of  the  former  committee,  that  a 
remittance  in  accordance  therewith  was  looked 
for,  and  that  his  resignation  of  the  financial 
guidance  of  the  choir  would  receive  prompt  con 
sideration. 

This  communication  might  have  been  made 
by  Ingles  personally,  or  it  might  have  been  sent 
by  his  office-boy,  or  it  might  even  (as  a  phys 
ical  possibility)  have  been  pushed  in  under  the 
crack  of  the  door  between  them.  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  it  came  through  the  mail.  So  formal  a 
transmission  of  so  formidable  a  communication 
was  conclusive ;  McDowell  felt  at  once  that  all 
possibility  of  personal  relations  between  himself 


213 


and  Ingles  was  at  an  end — that  door  in  the  wall 
between  them  was  as  good  as  bricked  up. 

Kittle  came  around  late  one  afternoon  to  see 
her  mother.  "  Do  you  know,  George,"  she  said 
to  her  brother,  "  that  Eugene  is  going  to  give  up 
our  pew  at  St.  Asaph's  ?  Can  you  imagine  why  ?" 

He  had  heard  and  read  a  good  deal  in  his  life 
time  about  the  fine  penetration  of  feminine  in 
tuition;  he  wondered  why  feminine  intuition  al 
ways  failed  when  it  came  up  for  application  to 
business  matters.  The  pretty,  high-held  female 
heads  that  would  droop  in  shame  if  they  could 
come  to  learn  the  how  and  wherefore  of  their 
own  costly  bedeckings !  Poor  innocent  Kittie — 
sitting  there  and  twirling  in  unsuspecting  sur 
prise  the  sparkling  novelties  that  encircled  her 
fingers,  and  never  caring  or  thinking  about  the 
means  by  which  they  had  come  to  ba  there  ! 

The  principal  instruments  in  McDowell's  set 
tlement  with  the  Ogden  estate  were  certain 
promissory  notes  and  certain  warranty  deeds- 
warranty,  after  quit-claims  had  boen  refused ; 
and  Ogden  found  himself  in  possession  of  his 
brother-in-law's  signature  on  several  bits  of  pa 
per  which  he  hoped  might  realize  their  full  value 
when  the  time  came,  and  also  of  two  or  three 
largish  tracts  of  suburban  property  in  which  the 
general  public  interest  seemed  rather  diminish 
ing  than  increasing.  McDowell  saved  the  best 
here,  just  as  he  had  managed  to  secure  the  best 


214 


of  his  father-in-law's  estate  for  his  wife.  In  the 
original  division  —  fair,  according  to  appraised 
values — his  knowledge  of  tendencies  of  growth 
had  put  into  his  wife's  third  almost  everything 
that  was  likely  to  show  a  quick  increase  in  price. 
George  took  his  notes  and  his  lands,  and  the 
task  of  turning  them  into  money ;  and  he  left  to 
Kittie  an  unimpaired  trust  and  confidence  in  her 
own  husband. 

The  matter  of  a  house  shared  his  thoughts, 
along  with  the  McDowell  business — an  October 
wedding,  a  week  for  a  trip,  and  then  the  begin 
ning  of  housekeeping  on  the  first  of  November 
in  a  home  of  their  own. 

"  You  want  to  see  Mrs.  Cass,"  Floyd  had  told 
him ;  "  she  fixed  us  up  when  we  first  came  out 
here." 

"  Who  is  she  ?" 

"A  clever  little  woman  who  makes  a  sort  of 
specialty  of  North -side  houses.  She  has  got 
desk -room  somewhere  upstairs  —  sixteenth  or 
seventeenth.  She  married  badly — her  husband 
doesn't  do  anything.  She  began  by  renting 
friends'  houses  to  other  friends,  and  has  kept  on 
until  she  has  worked  up  quite  a  business.  In 
such  a  big  town  as  this  has  got  to  be  you  need 
to  go  to  a  specialist  for  almost  everything. 
You  might  take  in  the  whole  lot  of  those  big 
house-renting  agencies  and  never  get  satisfied." 

The  office  of  the  Massachusetts  Brass  Com- 


215 


pany  was  as  much  a  social  exchange  as  ever. 
Jessie  frequently  came  down  with  Mrs.  Floyd 
and  Ann  and  Claudia,  and}  George  would  some 
times  step  up  to  see  her  for  a  few  minutes  dur 
ing  his  noonings.  Mrs.  Floyd  looked  upon  the 
meetings  indulgently  enough,  but  Ann  seemed 
to  hold  against  Ogden  a  deeply-seated  grudge. 

She  had  been  considerably  embarrassed  in  the 
matter  of  her  special  assessments,  and  she  had  as 
much  feeling  against  George  as  against  McDow 
ell  himself.  Her  efforts  to  fortify  and  to  recoup 
herself  had  led  her  into  other  fields  of  business, 
and  she  was  now  spending  a  good  part  of  every 
forenoon  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  Board  of 
Trade.  Thus  far  she  had  not  been  so  successful 
as  to  lessen  the  grudge. 

The  particular  institution  in  which  Ann  was 
interested  bore  some  external  resemblance  to  its 
great  prototype  across  the  street.  It  was  small 
er  and,  if  possible,  uglier;  but  it,  too,  had  its 
quadrangular  arcade,  its  big  square  skylight,  its 
ladies'  gallery.  In  this  gallery  Ann  sat  daily  for 
several  hours,  along  with  other  women  of  a  like 
turn  of  mind,  and  kept  an  eye  on  the  proceed 
ings  generally.  After  a  few  sessions  she  became 
accustomed  to  the  mere  externals  of  the  place — 
the  endless  shuffle  of  feet  on  the  grimy  floor,  the 
sharp  yawps  of  raw  and  eager  voices,  the  fling 
ing  aloft  of  excited  arms,  the  little  tangles  of 
noise  and  passion  that  were  instantly  woven 


216 


around  every  new-comer  with  an  offer  to  buy  or 
to  sell.  She  looked  over  this  choppy  sea  across 
to  the  promised  Ian4  that  was  being  portrayed 
on  the  opposite  blackboard ;  the  artist  paced  to 
and  fro  on  a  long,  high,  narrow  platform,  and 
worked  in  the  uncertainty  of  a  single  drop-light. 
He  frequently  changed  his  mind,  and  his  altera 
tions  usually  had  a  deep  and  sometimes  a  dis 
couraging  effect  upon  Ann  and  her  associates. 
Every  now  and  then  one  would  retire  into  the 
hallway  and  consult  with  her  agent,  and  then 
there  would  be  the  rustle  of  greenbacks,  and  the 
agent  would  take  the  elevator  down  and  present 
ly  be  seen  among  the  crowd  of  men  on  the  floor. 
The  agent  was  likely  to  be  a  gallant  fellow,  only 
too  happy  to  be  of  service  to  a  lady. 

Ann  was  now  a  member  of  Floyd's  household, 
in  good  and  regular  standing.  She  felt  herself 
very  much  at  home.  What  was  her  brother-in- 
law's  was  her  sister's,  and  what  was  her  sister's 
was  hers.  She  was  usually  the  first  to  unfold 
the  morning  paper;  she  pre-empted  the  bath 
room  with  little  regard  to  Walworth's  estab 
lished  habits ;  and  if  the  idea  of  some  trifling 

'  O 

delicacy  occurred  to  her  she  would  order  it  from 
the  grocery,  and  after  it  had  appeared  on  Wai- 
worth's  table  it  appeared  again  in  his  bill.  She 
did  not  stand  on  ceremony ;  she  waived  all  stiff 
formality  ;  cosily  and  frankly  she  was  quite  one 
of  the  family. 


217 


As  such,  she  used  "Wai worth's  office  quite  free 
ly,  and  in  the  same  capacity  she  joined  in  the 
conferences  which  the  Floyds  were  now  begin 
ning  to  hold  with  Atwater  up  under  his  great 
skylight  in  the  roof.  Atwater's  little  house  for 
Claudia  had  given  great  satisfaction,  and  he  was 
now  about  to  do  a  larger  one  for  Claudia's  pa 
rents,  who  had  begun  to  look  upon  their  banish 
ment  to  the  West  as  a  perpetual  fact.  Claudia's 
house  had  been  delivered  with  its  stairs,  its  win 
dows,  its  red  chimney,  and  its  chandeliers  — 
which  last  were  composed  by  a  pushing  young 
draughtsman  who  was  as  anxious  to  make  inter 
est  with  Atwater  as  Atwater  had  perhaps  been 
to  make  interest  with  Floyd. 

Atwater  was  accustomed  to  people  who  didn't 
know  their  own  minds,  to  people  who  knew  their 
own  minds  too  well,  to  people  who  had  too  many 
minds  to  really  have  any  mind  at  all,  and  to 
people  who  had  so  much  money  that  they  didn't 
need  to  have  any  mind.  He  was  impeccably 
suave  and  unruffled,  but  he  had  the  immense  ad 
vantage  of  being  able  to  impress  the  unduly 
brusque  and  capricious  and  exasperating  among 
his  clients  with  the  fact  that  they  were  dealing 
with  a  gentleman  and  an  artist.  He  also  put  a 
good  deal  of  "  presence  "  into  the  rendering  and 
the  collecting  of  his  accounts ;  there  was  no 
more  disputing  his  charges  than  his  taste. 

He  took  equally,  with  his  urbane  imperturba- 


218 


bility,  the  anxious  carpings  of  Mrs.  Floyd  and 
the  easy  joking  of  her  husband.  Ann  he  quietly 
ignored,  and  Wai  worth  thanked  him;  for  his 
sister-in-law's  interest  in  the  new  house  was  be 
coming  oppressively  personal.  As  for  Claudia, 
he  always  saw  that  she  had,  out  of  his  sample 
cabinet,  all  the  bits  of  tiling  and  scraps  of  mar- 
queterie  that  she  needed;  and  if  she  fancied  a 
promenade  among  the  boards  and  trestles  of  his 
drawing-room,  her  whim  was  gratified.  Ogden 
and  Jessie,  who  sometimes  came  too,  he  wel 
comed  pleasantly — the  guests  of  the  present  were 
the  clients  of  the  future.  Ogden  admired  his 
beautiful  manners  and  his  whitened  hair ;  one 
day  he  amusedly  recalled  Jessie's  determination 
to  make  her  husband's  hair  like  it. 

He  looked  at  At  water,  who  was  explaining  his 
preliminary  sketches  to  the  Floyds  and  was  try 
ing  to  fix  the  general  bearings  of  hall,  stairway, 
and  closets;  his  hair  looked  whiter  still  under 
the  diffused  glare  from  the  skylight. 

George  turned  to  Jessie,  with  his  hand  on  his 
own  head,  so  smooth  and  shining  brown. 

"  This  is  the  hair  you  are  to  whiten,"  he  said, 
and  he  lifted  his  eyebrows  in  a  smile. 

"  I  never  saw  such  a  boy !"  she  murmured  in 
a  repressed  ecstasy.  "  Do  you  remember  every 
thing  I  have  said?"  No  one  was  looking,  and 
she  placed  her  own  hand  on  his  other  temple. 

"  "Wouldn't  powder  do  ?"  he  asked  lightly. 


219 


«  Only  for  girls." 

"  Couldn't  it  be  bleached  F 

"  Not  and  get  that  color." 

" Must  I  suffer,  then?" — with  his  hand  still  on 
his  brow. 

"  I'm  afraid  that's  the  only  way."  She  low 
ered  his  hand  in  her  own,  and  gave  it  a  tender 
pressure  on  its  descent. 

"  Must  it  be  lingering,  or  something  sharp  and 
sudden?" 

She  pressed  his  hand  again,  and  looked  affec 
tionately  into  his  eyes.  "  Both,  perhaps." 

"  Will  it  be  fear  or  anxiety  or  shame  ?" 

"  Wait  and  see." 

Atwater  rolled  tip  his  sketches  and  threw 
them  into  a  drawer.  Then  he  went  to  his  cab 
inet  and  took  out  a  fe\v  small  strips  and  squares 
of  encaustic  tiling  in  yellow  and  gray. 

"And  now  I  wonder  if  our  little  Colleen 
wouldn't  like  to  take  some  of  these  home  to  play 
with."  He  turned  courteously  to  Mrs.  Floyd, 
while  his  hand  reached  out  for  a  sheet  of  brown 
paper. 

"  They're  not  too — too  heavy?"  she  asked,  cau 
tiously.  "  Nor  too  easily  broken  ?" 

The  child  opened  wide  her  brown  eyes,  in  one 
of  her  sober  little  ecstasies.  "  Oh,  plaze,  mam 
ma  !  Oh,  lave  me  have  them — do !" 

Ogden  turned  to  Jessie,  mutely  asking  her  to 
share  his  appreciation  of  this.  But  she  did  not 


220 


seem  especially  amused.  He  remembered,  then, 
that  to  himself  he  had  frequently  called  her 
treatment  of  Claudia  "  uneven."  Sometimes  the 
child  entertained  her,  sometimes  she  annoyed  her. 
Jessie  seemed  to  regard  her — and  he  felt  now  and 
then  that  she  so  regarded  children  generally — as 
a  doll  to  be  played  with  until  weariness  came, 
and  then  to  be  carelessly  thrust  away. 

"  Oh,  let  her  have  'em,"  said  Ann,  with  an  air 
of  authority. 

"  Yery  good  of  you,  I'm  sure,"  said  Floyd  to 
Atwater. 

"Not  at  all;  I'm  sampled  to  death.  There, 
my  child."  He  gave  her  a  neat  little  package. 
"  I'm  sure  they'll  understand  you  when  you  get 
to  Paris  1" 


XYII 

GEOKGE  OGDEN  and  Jessie  Bradley  were  mar 
ried  during  the  third  week  in  October.  The 
wedding  took  place  at  St.  Asaph's,  with  the  par 
ticipation  of  a  small  section  of  the  choir,  and  the 
Floyds  opened  their  house  for  the  reception  that 
followed.  Walworth  even  gave  George  a  small 
lunch  at  his  club. 

For  some  weeks  previous  Ogden  had  watched 
for  the  right  opportunity  to  make  a  formal  an 
nouncement  of  his  plans  to  the  head  of  the  bank 
and  to  ask  for  a  week's  leave.  For  nearly  a 
month,  now,  Brainard  had  not  looked  at  him, 
had  not  spoken  to  him ;  and  when  he  entered 
the  old  man's  office  to  make  his  request  Brain 
ard  still  refrained  from  looking  at  him,  and  in 
speaking  to  him  was  as  curt  as  possible. 

"  We  need  all  our  men  right  here ;  you  must 
give  up  any  idea  of  going  off." 

"  Blow  hot,  blow  cold,"  thought  George,  and 
asked  Jessie  what  she  preferred  to  do  under  the 
circumstances. 

She  had  planned  a  long  and  rapid  and  lavish 
tour,  and  the  tears  of  disappointment  started  to 
her  eves. 


"  Go  anyway,"  she  cried. 

"  Go  ?  Do  you  know  what  he  is  ?"  And  "  Do 
you  know  what  business  is  ?"  he  almost  added. 

She  lapsed  into  a  sullen  silence. 

"  We  could  arrange  the  wedding  for  a  Satur 
day,"  he  suggested,  "  and  spend  Sunday  in  Wis 
consin." 

This  proposition  stuck  in  her  throat,  but  pres 
ently  she  gulped  it  down.  "  Only  don't  call  it  a 
wedding-trip,"  she  said  tartly.  "  Well,"  she  went 
on,  "we'll  settle  that.  We  must,  because  the 
cards  have  got  to  be  started  out  pretty  soon — all 
those  people  who  have  entertained  me  have  got 
to  be  remembered.  There's  some  in  Providence, 
and  in  Detroit,  and  in  St.  Paul.  And  don't  let 
me  forget  those  Louisville  people  that  took  me 
to  Old  Point." 

They  spent  their  Sunday  in  Oconomowoc, 
along  with  the  Seven  Bridegrooms.  The  day 
was  wet  and  gloomy,  and  most  of  the  time  they 
sat  in-doors  over  a  grate-fire.  Mists  dulled  the 
blazing  red  of  the  maples,  and  a  thick  fall  of 
leaves  was  churned  into  the  mud  before  the 
house  by  the  wheels  of  farm  wagons  returning 
home  from  church.  Only  at  sunset  did  the 
clouds  clear  away,  and  the  full  moon  rose  over 
one  lake  while  the  sun  sank  below  the  other. 

George  recalled  this  many  times  in  after- 
years. 

They  had  taken  a  house  in  Walton  Place  for 


223 


the  year  and  a  half  from  November  first.  The 
house  had  been  vacant  some  little  time,  and  the 
landlord  made  no  account  of  an  introductory 
fortnight. 

Mrs.  Bradley  had  come  in  from  Hinsdale  and 
had  superintended  most  of  the  furnishing  and 
fitting  up.  She  saw  the  window-shades  put  into 
place  and  told  the  men  where  to  set  the  refrig 
erator,  and  Jessie  had  looked  on  with  the  gay 
irresponsibility  of  a  child  who  watches  puppets 
being  strung. 

On  their  return  from  Wisconsin  they  found 
the  house  decorated  almost  throughout  with 
chrysanthemums.  The  new  green-house  at  Hins 
dale  had  devoted  the  whole  autumn  to  this 
specialty. 

Jessie  sank  down  into  one  of  her  big  new 
easy-chairs.  "  Nothing  to  do  but  to  be  happy," 
she  sighed,  with  a  long  and  delicious  expiration. 

She  had  her  days,  but  those  dates  were  of 
course  overridden  by  her  intimates. 

Among  the  first  to  call  were  the  Floyds. 
"Walworth  came  over  with  a  pocketful  of  cigars 
— to  christen  the  new  wall-paper,  he  said. 

"  Have  you  got  any  closets  ?"  was  one  of  his 
questions. 

"  Plenty,"  replied  George. 

"  Then  I  don't  see  but  what  you're  all  right — 
just  as  well  off  in  a  house  that  you  rent  as  we 
are  going  to  be  in  a  house  made  to  order.  If 


224 


ever  I  turn  architect" — with  a  glance  towards 
his  wife — "  I  shall  begin  every  house  with  a 
dozen  closets  and  then  pour  in  the  various  rooms 
around  them.  Four  drawers  in  every  one,  and 
t\vo  rows  of  hooks.  How  stuff  does  accumu 
late  !" 

"  Yes,  the  inside  is  rather  nice,"  Jessie  ac 
knowledged  ;  "  but  the  outside  might  be  im 
proved.  I  have  my  own  notion  about  the  porch 
and  the  front  door." 

George  turned  to  her,  as  if  to  ask  what  that 
notion  might  be. 

Other  friends  followed — Brower  among  them. 

He  went  about  rather  shyly,  looking  at  the 
draperies  and  grilles  and  mirrors.  In  the  semi- 
gloom  of  the  dining-room  he  threw  his  arm  over 
Ogden's  shoulder  and  looked  into  his  eye  with  a 
friendly  and  affectionate  smile. 

"  I  never  expected  you  to  do  it,"  he  said.  "  You 
have  left  me  as  lonesome  as  the  deuce." 

"Doit?     Why  not?" 

"  Because  you're  so  careful ;  you  always  think 
things  out — regular  old  Puritan  sage." 

"  Oh,  well,"  began  George,  with  the  air  proper 
to  a  launching  out  into  a  broad  and  easy  gener 
alization,  "  aren't  we  New  England  Puritans  the 
cream  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  race  ?  And  why  does 
the  Anglo-Saxon  race  rule  the  globe  except  be 
cause  the  individual  Anglo-Saxon  can  rule  him 
self?" 


225 


"  Oh,  I  know,"  said  Brower,  discontentedly ; 
"  that's  all  right,  up  to  a  certain  point." 

Others  came,  among  them  the  Valentines. 

"  And  how  do  you  like  your  new  house  ?"  asked 
Mrs.  Valentine,  effusively.  She  addressed  Jessie 
exclusively;  with  her  everything  went  in  the 
female  line.  "We  are  new  converts  too,  you 
know — just  over  from  the  West  Side.  We  are 
very  much  pleased,  aren't  we,  Adrian  ?" 

Her  husband  gave  his  corroborative  little  bow. 
"  We  were  being  left  rather  aside,  over  there," 
he  admitted.  "And  take  the  South  Side,  for 
that  matter.  Business  is  walking  right  over 
them,  and  the  whole  section  is  in  a  state  of  mild 
panic  from  the  Courts  to  Oakwood  Boulevard. 
Yes,  we're  safe  and  quiet,  and  settled  to  stay." 

Still  others  came,  among  them  Cornelia  Tilling- 
hast  Brainard.  She  called  frequently,  she  usual 
ly  brought  her  husband  with  her,  and  she  never 
failed  to  walk  him  all  around  the  Ogdens'  neigh 
borhood.  Her  favorite  time  was  Sunday  after 
noon  ;  then  she  took  him  along  the  Lake  Shore 
Drive  and  through  all  the  adjacent  streets,  with 
the  full  benefit  of  daylight. 

Cornelia  now  had  command  over  a  good  seven 
hundred  thousand  dollars,  and  she  was  arming 
for  the  social  fray.  She  meant  to  bang  her  shield 
against  the  shields  of  other  amazons.  The  gladi 
ator  must  come  to  the  arena,  and  the  centre  of 
the  arena  seemed  to  be  somewhere  near  the 
15 


226 


water- works  tower.  If  Burton  was  going  to  put 
seventy  or  eighty  thousand  dollars  into  a  house, 
the  site  of  it  must  not  be  too  far  away  from  this 
point. 

"I  expect  I  shall  cut  a  pretty  wide  swath," 
Cornelia  acknowledged  to  herself. 

Jessie  had  her  receptions  through  November; 
her  intimates  appeared  at  these  as  well,  and  so 
did  many  of  her  more  formal  acquaintances. 

On  one  of  these  occasions  George,  having  left 
the  bank  early,  after  a  light  day,  hurried  home, 
dressed  himself,  and  hastened  down  to  the  par 
lor.  Its  contracted  space  was  beflowered  and 
belighted,  and  quite  a  little  throng  of  ladies  were 
circulating  and  chatting  there.  Mrs.  Floyd  and 
Miss  Wilde  were  among  them ;  so  were  Mrs.  Og- 
den  and  Kittie ;  so  were  Mrs.  Valentine  and  Mrs. 
Atwater. 

His  wife  hurried  up  to  him ;  her  cheeks  were 
flushed  and  her  large  eyes  burned  brightly. 

"  If  you  had  only  been  three  minutes  sooner ! 
She  has  just  gone.  She  was  telling  me  why  she 
hadn't  been  able  to  come  to  the  wedding.  I 
wanted  you  to  meet  her  so  much." 

"  Who  is  this  ?" 

"  Cecilia  Ingles." 

"  There  is  such  a  person,  then  ?" 

"  Why,  George,  what  do  you  mean  ?  Of  course 
there  is,  and  she  was  just  as  nice  to  me  as  she 
could  be." 


HOW   WELL   IT'S  DONE  !'      SHE   SAID   TO   HIM." 


227 


"Why  shouldn't  she  have  been?  I  see  you 
call  her  Cecilia.  Are  you  as  intimate  as  that  ?" 

"  Everybody  calls  her  Cecilia.  See,  Mrs.  At- 
water  is  trying  to  catch  your  eye." 

A  tall  and  rather  stately  woman  of  thirty-five 
was  standing  in  the  doorway;  she  seemed  fin 
ished — in  profile,  figure,  and  carriage.  "  How 
well  it's  done,"  she  said  to  him ;  "  who  is  the 
presiding  genius  ?" 

"  My  wife's  mother,  I  fancy."  He  turned  and 
drew  her  attention  to  the  rustling  of  Mrs.  Brad- 
ley's  black  silk. 

"  Ah !"  she  said  indifferently,  and  turned 
away. 

He  had  been  unable  to  apprehend  the  simple 
costliness  of  his  questioner's  dress,  and  he  only 
half  wondered  how,  in  a  dozen  quiet  words,  she 
had  conveyed  the  impression  of  an  expert  ad 
dressing  a  beginner ;  but  he  could  not  refrain 
from  asking  himself  if  there  was  a  slight  here 
on  Mrs.  Bradley.  He  looked  at  the  old  lady 
again.  She  was  moving  about  with  the  greatest 
show  of  confidence  and  good- will.  No  thought 
of  anything  called  "differences"  had  entered 
her  head.  She  did  not  believe  that  anybody 
would  want  to  slight  her  or  that  anybody  could. 
She  had  come  on  the  ground  in  the  early  days 
of  simple  friendliness,  and  perhaps  she  was  too 
old  to  apprehend  that  anything  different  had 
developed  in  the  meanwhile.  She  certainly 


228 


seemed  to  need  no  defence,  and  George  was  as 
suredly  in  no  position  to  offer  any. 

"  Cecilia  has  gone  off  and  left  me,"  Mrs.  At- 
water  resumed ;  "  careless  girl !"  They  were 
half-sisters,  and  Mrs.  At  water  was  several  years 
the  elder.  The  Atwaters  and  the  Ingleses  ran  as 
a  kind  of  four-in-hand.  The  rich  sister  had  mar 
ried  a  poor  man,  and  the  poor  sister  had  married 
a  rich  man,  and  they  all  went  along  at  the  same 
pace.  It  was  a  somewhat  rapid  pace.  "  I'm 
going  to  see  what  Mrs.  Floyd  can  do  for  me ;  I 
dare  say  she  has  a  spare  seat." 

His  wife  caught  at  Mrs.  Atwater  and  bade  her 
adieu  with  effusion.  Did  Jessie  regard  it  as  a 
feat  and  a  triumph  to  have  secured  her  presence  ? 
So  it  seemed  to  Jessie's  husband. 

The  last  of  these  little  receptions  was  disposed 
of,  and  the  honeymoon  drew  to  its  close.  Quiet 
succeeded  this  introductory  flurry  to  married 
life,  and  George  now  took  occasion  to  lay  a 
steady  hand  upon  the  throbbings  of  the  "  pocket- 
nerve." 

His  apprehension  of  any  suffering  in  this  part 
of  his  financial  anatomy  was,  indeed,  largely  an 
ticipatory  ;  it  was  not  that  the  nerve  had  been 
roughly  touched,  but  that  it  soon  might  be.  He 
had  no  tendency  towards  a  retrospective  study  of 
the  journal-and-ledger  aspects  of  his  courtship. 
He  had  been  spared  the  expense  of  the  wedding- 
journey  that  Jessie  had  planned  by  the  unac- 


229 


countable  veto  of  Brainard.  And  the  remuner 
ation  of  St.  Asaph's  choir  and  kindred  matters 
had  fallen  to  his  wife's  father  to  arrange.  But, 
all  the  same,  many  small  indications  arose  to 
make  it  worth  while  for  him  to  remember  that 
he  was  a  young  man  on  a  moderate  salary  and 
that  most  of  his  available  means  were  badly 
tied  up. 

He  noticed  that  his  wife  was  developing  a  dis 
dain  of  the  public  conveyances ;  a  carriage  was 
sometimes  required  of  afternoons,  and  invariably 
of  evenings  when  dances  or  theatre-going  might 
be  the  matter  in  hand.  She  was  also  cultivating 
her  taste  for  flowers ;  she  had  employed  them 
rather  lavishly  at  her  receptions  (in  conjunction 
with  her  mandolin-players),  and  her  apprecia 
tion  of  them  kept  equal  pace  with  the  advancing 
coldness  of  the  weather  and  their  own  advanc 
ing  cost.  She  also  betrayed  a  ravenous  taste  for 
the  exasperating  superfluities  of  house-furnishing, 
and  his  bills  for  things  needful  were  attended  by 
a  train  of  little  accounts  for  things  quite  worse 
than  useless. 

"  Oh,  well,  we  shall  be  fitted  out  pretty  soon," 
he  sighed  ;  and  he  saw  his  studious  face  reflected 
from  among  the  cluttered  bibelots  of  his  mantel 
piece. 

The  point  of  completion  as  regarded  the  in 
terior  was  finally  reached,  and  his  wife's  inten 
tions  as  to  the  exterior  presently  developed.  She 


230 


accompanied  him.  out  into  the  vestibule  one 
morning,  and  stood  at  the  head  of  the  steps  to 
bid  him  good-by. 

"  These  doors  are  awfully  shabby  and  old- 
fashioned,"  she  declared.  "  Don't  you  suppose 
the  landlord  would  put  in  new  ones  ?" 

"I'm  quite  sure  he  wouldn't.  I  wouldn't  in 
his  place." 

"  Well,  we  have  taken  this  house  for  a  year 
and  a  half,  and  are  likely  to  take  it  again  for  a 
year  or  two  longer.  Why  couldn't  we  fix  things 
up  ourselves  ?  The  entrance  counts  more,  really, 
than  anything  else." 

"  That  might  be  thought  about." 

"  Yes,  indeed.  If  Mary  Munson  is  coming  to 
see  me,  I  want  things  as  nice  as  they  have  ev 
erything." 

Mary  Munson  was  of  the  Louisville  family 
that  had  entertained  Jessie  Bradley  at  Old  Point 
Comfort.  It  presently  transpired  that  she  was 
under  like  obligations  to  many  other  acquaint 
ances  of  her  girlhood. 

"  I  must  pay  them  up,"  she  explained.  "  Besides, 
I  need  company — all  alone  here  during  the  day, 
and  mamma  away  off  there  in  the  country." 

The  succession  of  Mary  Munsons  lasted,  in 
deed,  through  into  spring.  Flowers,  carriages, 
and  matinee -tickets  doubled  up  finely,  and  the 
hideous  mien  of  the  caterer  was  seen  in  connec 
tion  with  frequent  lunches. 


231 


"I  spoke  to  Mr.  Atwater  to-day  about  the 
front  of  the  house,"  she  said  to  him  one  evening 
towards  the  close  of  dinner.  "Maggie  didn't 
quite  get  around  to  pudding  to-day,"  she  went  on, 
as  the  dessert  came  in,  "  so  I  sent  out  for  tfyis  ice 
cream.  Take  some  of  these  lady-fingers  with  it." 

"  To  Atwater  ?" 

"  Yes.  Frances  wanted  me  to  go  up  with  her 
and  see  the  drawings  for  the  front  of  their  house. 
It's  going  to  be  lovely.  He  had  some  special  lit 
tle  drawings  for  the  outside  doors,  and  things 
like  that.  He's  got  beautiful  taste." 

"  I  know  he  has." 

"  I  asked  him  to  design  some  doors  for  us." 

"You  did?" 

"  Yes.  He  said  he  had  a  new  idea  that  he'd 
like  to  try." 

"  You  must  get  your  landlord  to  pass  on  that. 
He  might  not  like  the  new  idea." 

"  Think  not ?" 

"  He  might  object.  It  would  all  come  on  his 
hands  in  the  end." 

"  We'd  better  go  on  with  it,  don't  you  think?" 

"  But  don't  let  it  be  anything  too  unusual  or 
too  elaborate."  Architects,  he  understood,  gen 
erally  charged  a  commission  on  the  cost  of  the 
work;  so  much  per  cent.  —  five,  he  had  heard. 
"  We  don't  want  to  go  in  too  deep." 

They  left  the  table  and  sauntered  slowly  into 
the  parlor  —  the  drawing-room,  Jessie  called  it. 


232 

The  standing  lamp  sent  out  a  broad  glare  from 
under  its  shade  of  crinkled  yellow  paper,  and  the 
floor  of  the  room  burned  with  a  dull  and  unac 
customed  red  —  the  red  of  a  handsome  Turkish 
rug. 

"  Ah,  what's  this  ?"  exclaimed  George. 

"  I  picked  it  up  to-day,"  she  said ;  "  it  was  so 
pretty  and  just  the  thing  for  this  room.  Cecilia 
called  it  a  great  bargain  —  she  knows  all  about 
rugs." 

"Then  you  have  been  shopping  with  Mrs. 
Ingles?" 

"  Well,  she  was  getting  a  few  things.  She 
said  that  sixty  dollars  was  little  enough  for  it." 

"  Sixty  dollars !     Did  you  pay  for  it  ?" 

"  I  had  it  charged." 

"Charged?" 

"  Yes ;  wasn't  that  right  ?  Why,  George,  even 
poor  mamma,  away  out  there  in  Hinsdale,  has 
her  account  at  Field's." 


XVIII 

THE  drawings  for  the  embellishment  of  the 
house  on  Walton  Place  were  undertaken  by  At- 
water,  and  their  scope  broadened  under  the  ar 
tist's  hands.  George,  at  his  wife's  request,  took 
the  elevator  one  noon  and  went  up  to  the  roof  to 
see  them. 

In  Atwater's  absence  he  was  received  by  the 
head  draughtsman.  The  scheme  had  widened, 
as  such  schemes  will ;  there  were  suggestions  for 
the  porch  and  for  new  hand  -  rails.  There  was 
also  a  drawing  for  a  cornice  in  harmony. 

"  Urn,"  said  George,  thoughtfully.  "  This  is 
all  very  handsome." 

At  about  the  same  time  that  work  on  the 
Ogden  house  began,  the  work  on  the  plans  for 
the  Floyd  house  received  a  check.  This  check 
was  due  to  the  first  Western  trip  of  Winthrop  C. 
Floyd,  treasurer  of  the  Massachusetts  Brass  Com 
pany.  He  came  on  a  general  visit  of  inspection. 

The  morning  after  his  arrival  he  sat  in  the  of 
fice  of  the  Chicago  branch ;  he  had  come  down 
with  Mrs.  Floyd  and  Claudia.  His  keen  and 
quiet  eye  ran  over  the  furnishings  of  the  place. 


He  was  a  bachelor  of  forty ;  he  was  dressed  sim 
ply  but  elegantly — he  was  completely  comme  il 
faut,  except  for  his  muddy  shoes,  which  seemed 
to  trouble  him. 

"  Well,  Walworth,"  he  said,  with  the  manner 
of  an  elder  brother  and  of  an  official  whose  dic 
tum  had  weight,  "  you  are  pretty  well  fixed  up 
out  here — better  than  the  home  office,  in  fact." 

"Have  to  be,"  returned  the  other.  "Down 
East  everybody  knows  the  company ;  you  could 
do  business  in  a  coal -shed  if  you  wanted  to. 
Here  it's  different.  People  don't  know  us  from 
a  hole  in  the  ground ;  they  go  by  what  they 
see." 

"  Do  you  use  all  these  calls  and  things  ?" 

The  wall  was  set  with  electrical  devices  for 
calling  boys  from  everywhere  for  everything. 

"  Sometimes.  Anyway  it  looks  as  if  we  did, 
and  that  helps  business." 

Little  Claudia  came  creeping  up  to  his  desk. 

"  When  are  you  going  to  begin,  papa  ?  I've 
come  down  to  see  you  do  it." 

"  Do  what,  my  dear  ?" 

"  Make  money.  You  said  you  did  it  here. 
When  are  you  going  to  begin  ?" 

Winthrop  swung  his  chair  towards  the  window 
and  looked  out  at  the  driving  rain  and  at  the 
crowds  of  vehicles  and  passengers  in  the  filthy 
streets  below. 

"  Yes,"  he  said,  under  his  breath  ;  "  when  are 


235 


you  going  to  begin  ?"     Then  aloud,  "  "What  a 
beastly  hole  !     Is  there  no  government  here  ?" 

"Precious  little  for  a  million  and  a  half  of 
people,  and  precious  bad  what  there  is." 

"  A  million  and  a  half  ?    Nonsense !" 

"Why  nonsense?  There's  the  census,  and 
there's  the  regular  annual  increase." 

Winthrop  favored  his  brother  with  a  stare 
of  frank  curiosity.  Walworth  had  spoken  with 
some  warmth  ;  he  seemed  disposed  to  throw  an 
undue  ardor  into  his  defence  of  his  adopted 
home — a  city  where  quality  seemed  to  count  for 
less  than  quantity,  and  where  the  "  prominent " 
citizen  made  the  "  eminent "  citizen  a  super 
fluity.  Then,  too,  Winthrop  coupled  with  the 
earnest  lines  in  his  brother's  forehead  a  slightly 
dingy  necktie  under  his  brother's  chin.  He  ob 
served,  moreover,  in  the  polishing  of  the  shoe 
which  Walworth,  for  greater  emphasis,  was 
beating  on  the  carpet,  a  neglect  of  the  heel  in 
favor  of  the  toe.  And  there  were  several  other 
indications  of  a  growing  carelessness  in  dress. 

"  Well,  Walworth,"  he  remarked,  "  you  are 
getting  acclimated,  I  guess." 

"  Not  to  this  sort  of  thing.  Yes,  there's  a 
million  and  a  half  of  us  here,  and  this  little 
quarter  of  a  square  mile  is  probably  the  most 
crowded  and  the  most  active  of  any  on  the 
globe,  and  yet  it  isn't  found  worth  while  to 
keep  it  clean,  or  even  decent,  small  as  it  is.  On 


236 


days  like  this  you  feel  as  if  you  just  wanted  to 
remove  the  inhabitants  and  annex  the  whole 
place  to  the  Stock-yards." 

Mrs.  Floyd  paused  in  the  adjustment  of  her 
bedraggled  skirts  and  looked  up  fiercely. 

"  Why  remove  the  inhabitants  ?"  she  inquired. 

"  Frances  !"  called  her  husband. 

"  Why,  indeed  V  asked  Winthrop.  "  I  never 
saw  such  a  beastly  rabble  in  my  life." 

"  Nor  I,"  she  cried.  All  her  smouldering  re 
sentment  against  the  town  broke  out  with  the 
appearance  of  a  new  Eastern  ally. 

"  Except  in  Madrid  or  Naples."  Winthrop 
had  travelled  in  his  younger  days;  he  never 
made  these  European  comparisons  except  under 
extreme  provocation. 

"  Why  are  things  so  horrible  in  this  country  ?" 
demanded  Mrs.  Floyd,  plaintively. 

"  Because  there's  no  standard  of  manners — no 
resident  country  gentry  to  provide  it.  Our  own 
rank  country  folks  have  never  had  such  a  check, 
and  this  horrible  rout  of  foreign  peasantry  has 
just  escaped  from  it.  What  little  culture  we 
have  in  the  country  generally  we  find  principal 
ly  in  a  few  large  cities,  and  they  have  become  so 
large  that  the  small  element  that  works  for  a 
bettering  is  completely  swamped." 

He  looked  almost  pityingly  on  his  brother. 
"This  is  no  town  for  a  gentleman,"  he  felt 
obliged  to  acknowledge.  "  What  an  awful 


237 


thing,"  he  admitted  further,  "  to  have  only  one 
life  to  live,  and  to  be  obliged  to  live  it  in  such  a 
place  as  this !" 

But  pity  was  not  an  important  factor  in  Win- 
throp's  Western  mission.  The  Chicago  office 
was  costing  too  much  and  earning  too  little. 
There  was  to  be  a  general  reduction  and  scaling- 
down;  the  most  important  part  of  Winthrop's 
baggage  was  the  pruning-knife. 

He  remained  a  week.  He  used  the  knife  pret 
ty  thoroughly.  He  snipped  Atwater's  plans  for 
Walworth's  house  into  very  small  pieces.  He 
left  Walworth  in  a  great  state  of  depression — a 
depression  deeper  than  any  he  had  felt  since  his 
failure  in  coffee  and  spices. 

His  last  evening  in  Chicago  he  spent  in  Wai- 
worth's  library.  It  was  a  sober  little  room,  and 
Walworth  was  the  soberest  man  in  it.  His  wife 
made  only  an  occasional  emergence  from  her  un 
quiet  silence ;  she  no  longer  looked  on  Winthrop 
as  an  ally.  The  Fairchilds  were  there,  and  the 
Ogdens  dropped  in  during  the  course  of  the 
evening.  Fairchild  and  Winthrop  did  most  of 
the  talking. 

Winthrop's  sensibilities  had  now  lost  their 
keenest  edge ;  the  weather  had  improved,  and 
the  general  aspect  of  things  was  a  little  less  dis 
gusting.  He  listened  to  Fairchild  with  the  cau 
tious  reserve  of  a  maturity  that  was  accustomed 
to  meet  elderly  strangers.  He  acknowledged, 


238 


too,  that  the  city  was  a  big  fact,  and  perhaps 
a  more  complicated  fact  than  he  had  imagined. 

"You  have  seen  the  foundations,"  Fairchild 
said  to  him.  The  old  gentleman  lay  back  in  his 
chair  and  spoke  in  a  quiet  and  dispassionate 
tone.  "It  has  taken  fifty  years  to  put  them  in, 
but  the  work  is  finally  done  and  well  done. 
And  now  we  are  beginning  to  build  on  these 
foundations.  We  might  have  put  up  our  build 
ing  first  and  then  put  in  the  underpinning  after 
wards.  That  is  a  common  way,  but  ours  will  be 
found  to  have  its  advantages." 

"  I  dare  say,"  admitted  Winthrop ;  "  but  you 
have  made  an  awful  muss  doing  it." 

"Well,"  rejoined  Fairchild,  "you  may  look  at 
the  external  aspect  of  things,  which  is  distress 
ing  enough,  I  acknowledge,  or  you  may  consider 
the  people  themselves,  who  are  perhaps  the  real 
essential." 

"  Winthrop  finds  them  rather  distressing  too." 
It  was  Wai  worth  who  spoke ;  his  voice  came  in 
a  muffled  tone  from  the  darkest  corner  of  the 
room. 

"'What  have  we  done  to  him?"  demanded 
Jessie  Ogden,  quickly.  "Haven't  we  received 
him  well  ?" 

Winthrop  had  no  ground  for  individual  com 
plaint,  and  he  hastened  to  make  this  clear.    Per-  • 
sonally,  he  had  been  made  a  great  deal  of.     He 
was  rather  a  large  figure  at  home,  and  he  natu- 


239 


rally  grew  larger  still  the  farther  he  travelled 
West. 

"  I  don't  think  it  can  be  denied,"  pursued  Fair- 
child,  tranquilly,  "  that  new-comers  are  pretty 
well  received  here,  whether  they  come  to  stay 
or  to  pass  on  or  to  go  back.  All  that  a  man 
has  to  do,  in  order  to  insure  good  treatment,  is 
to  put  a  certain  valuation  on  himself.  That 
done,  the  more  he  claims,  the  more  he  receives ; 
we  take  him  at  his  own  figure.  The  more  I 
think  of  it,  the  more  I  am  astonished  at  so  much 
humility  among  people  who  have  accomplished 
such  great  results.  Commercially,  we  feel  our 
own  footing ;  socially,  we  are  rather  abashed  by 
the  pretensions  that  any  new  arrival  chooses  to 
make.  We  are  a  little  afraid  of  him,  and,  to  teL1 
the  truth,  we  are  a  little  afraid  of  each  other." 

"  H'm,"  said  Winthrop,  rather  grimly ;  "  Bos 
ton  goes  farther  than  that.  Some  of  our  great 
lights  are  almost  afraid  of  themselves." 

"I've  noticed,"  remarked  Mrs.  Floyd,  "that 
there  is  a  good  deal  of  watching  and  waiting  for 
cues — people  of  plain  origin  who  are  beginning 
to  take  upon  themselves  the  forms  of  social  or 
ganization."  She  spoke  like  a  princess  of  the 
blood-royal. 

"  That  is  the  point,"  said  Fairchild.  "  Indi 
vidually,  we  may  be  of  a  rather  humble  grade  of 
atoms,  but  we  are  crystallizing  into  a  compound 
that  is  going  to  exercise  a  tremendous  force.  To 


240 


him  that  hath  eyes  this  crystallization,  this  or 
ganization,  is  the  great  thing  to  note  just  now." 

"I  acknowledge  to  have  seen  the  ferment  of 
activity,  as  they  call  it,"  said  Winthrop. 

"  You  may  have  seen  the  boiling  of  the  kettle," 
returned  Fairchild,  "but  you  have  hardly  seen 
the  force  that  feeds  the  flame.  The  big  build 
ings  are  all  well  enough,  and  the  big  crowds  in 
the  streets,  and  the  reports  of  the  banks  and  rail 
ways  and  the  Board  of  Trade.  But  there  is  some 
thing,  now,  beyond  and  behind  all  that." 

"  Let  me  tell  Winthrop,"  broke  in  Mrs.  Floyd. 
"  Since  I  can't  take  him  to  our  club,  I  must  bring 
the  club  to  him.  At  our  last  meeting" — there 
was  a  sub-acid  relish  in  all  this — "  it  developed 
that  the  present  intellectual  situation  in  Chicago 
is  precisely  that  of  Florence  in  the  days  of  the — 
the—" 

"  Medici,"  suggested  Ogden. 

"Yes,  the  Medici,"  said  Ann  Wilde,  loudly. 
She  looked  at  him  with  a  sharp  aversion ;  he 
seemed  to  be  taking  part  in  her  sister's  joke. 
"  That's  just  exactly  what  my  paper  said ;  the 
Florence  of  the  Medici  after  the  dispersal  of 
the  Greek  scholars  from  Constantinople  by  the 
Turks." 

"  Oh,  murder !"  said  Walworth  to  himself ; 
"  what  will  Ann  rig  up  next  ?" 

"  The  Florentines  of  that  day,"  pursued  his 
sister-in-law,  "didnt  know  so  very  much,  per- 


241 


haps,  but  they  were  bound  to  learn,  and  that 
was  the  main  thing.     And  it's  just  so  here." 

"  Quite  right,"  said  Fairchild ;  "  we  know  what 
there  is  to  learn,  and  we  are  determined  to  mas 
ter  it.  Our  Constantinoples  are  Berlin  and  Lon 
don  and  the  rest — yes,  Boston,  too ;  and  all  their 
learned  exiles  are  flocking  here  to  instruct  us." 

"  And  the  books  that  are  coming  in !"  cried 
Jessie  Ogden.  She  was  no  great  reader,  and  she 
spoke  less  as  a  student  than  as  a  Chicagoan — 
that  is,  she  spoke  more  ardently  than  any  stu 
dent  could  have  spoken.  "  Does  the  enemy 
know  that  four  of  the  biggest  buildings  in  this 
big  city  are  built  of  books  ?" 

"  The  new  libraries,"  her  husband  explained— 
"  the  ones  that  are  going  to  make  us  the  literary 
centre." 

"  Dear  me,"  said  Winthrop,  "  are  you  expect 
ing  that  ?" 

"  Oh,  yes.  And  we  expect  to  be  the  financial 
centre,  and  presently  the  political  centre,  too — 
Chicago,  plus  New  York  and  Washington." 

"  And  where  is  Boston  ?" 

"  A  little  behind,"  said  Fairchild.  "  New  York 
is  the  main-mast  yet ;  Chicago  ranks  as  foremast 
— at  present ;  while  Boston  is — " 

"  The  mizzen-mast,"  completed  Ogden. 

"  And  we  Chicago  folks  stand  at  the  bow," 
chimed  in  his  wife,  "  and  sniff  the  first  freshness 
of  the  breeze." 
16 


242 


"  Yes,"  said  Winthrop,  in  satirical  assent ;  "the 
4  Windy  City.'" 

"  Don't  abuse  our  wind,"  cried  Mrs.  Floyd ; 
"  we  should  all  die  like  flies  without  it." 

"  That's  so,"  assented  her  husband.  "  The 
wind  is  our  only  scavenger." 

"  I  see,"  said  Winthrop.  "  If  you  can  only  be 
big  you  don't  mind  being  dirty." 

Then,  half  in  amusement,  half  in  amaze,  he 
concentrated  his  attention  on  the  banker.  "  Can 
it  be  that  there  are  really  any  such  expectations 
here  as  these?"  He  addressed  Fairchild  exclu 
sively — the  oldest  and  most  sedate  of  the  circle. 

"  Why  not  ?"  returned  Fairchild.  "  Does  it 
seem  unreasonable  that  the  State  which  produced 
the  two  greatest  figures  of  the  greatest  epoch  in 
our  history,  and  which  has  done  most  within  the 
last  ten  years  to  check  alien  excesses  and  un- 
American  ideas,  should  also  be  the  State  to  give 
the  country  the  final  blend  of  the  American  char 
acter  and  its  ultimate  metropolis  ?" 

"  And  you  personally — is  this  your  own  be 
lief  ?» 

Fairchild  leaned  back  his  fine  old  head  on  the 
padded  top  of  his  chair  and  looked  at  his  question 
er  with  the  kind  of  pity  that  has  a  faint  tinge 
of  weariness.  His  wife  sat  beside  him  silent,  but 
with  her  hand  on  his,  and  when  he  answered  she 
pressed  it  meaningly;  for  to  the  Chicagoan— 
even  the  middle-aged  female  Chicagoan  —  the 


243 


name  of  the  town,  in  its  formal,  ceremonial  use, 
has  a  power  that  no  other  word  in  the  language 
quite  possesses.  It  is  a  shibboleth,  as  regards  its 
pronunciation ;  it  is  a  trumpet-call,  as  regards  its 
effect.  It  has  all  the  electrifying  and  unifying 
power  of  a  college  yell. 

"  Chicago  is  Chicago,"  he  said.  "  It  is  the  be 
lief  of  all  of  us.  It  is  inevitable ;  nothing  can 
stop  us  now." 

But  Winthrop  Floyd  was  glad  to  withdraw 
himself  on  the  morrow  from  his  temporary  en 
listment — or  drafting — under  the  vociferous  ban 
ner  of  the  Western  capital.  He  did  all  in  his 
power,  as  well,  to  oppose  its  manifest  destiny  by 
transmitting  to  Wai  worth,  immediately  after  his 
return  to  Boston,  a  full  corporate  confirmation 
of  his  own  anathema  against  Walworth's  office 
and  house.  The  Chicago  representative  of  the 
Massachusetts  Brass  Company  was  recommend 
ed  to  secure  less  expensive  quarters  at  the  ear 
liest  opportunity,  and  was  directed  to  drop  his 
architectural  scheme  forthwith. 

Wai  worth  at  once  adjusted  matters  with  At- 
water.  The  architect  received  his  "  reconsidera 
tion  "  with  composure,  but  he  was  doubtless  net 
tled  to  be  balked  in  a  work  in  which  he  had 
taken  unusual  personal  interest,  and  he  was  also 
disappointed  merely  to  be  paid  for  his  plans 
when  he  had  looked  for  the  fees  that  follow  con 
struction.  These  considerations  may  have  had 


244 


their  influence  on  the  account  which  he  rendered 
a  month  later  to  the  Ogdens — friends  and  rela 
tives  of  the  Floyds,  and  introduced,  too,  by  them. 
This  account  was  handed  in  much  more  prompt 
ly  than  is  generally  the  case  with  an  accredited 
client  in  other  professions— the  legal  or  the  med 
ical,  let  us  say — and  its  final  footing  caused  Og- 
den  considerable  consternation. 

The  account  was  mailed  to  the  house  instead 
of  to  the  bank,  and  the  stationery  employed  was 
such  as  to  suggest  a  personal  matter  between 
gentlemen  rather  than  a  purely  business  matter 
between  architect  and  client ;  and  Ogden  opened 
it  under  his  wife's  eyes  to  learn  that  design  had 
cost  him  more  than  construction. 

"  Your  drawings  are  more  of  an  item  than 
your  porch  itself,"  he  said,  rather  faintly.  "  I 
shall  have  to  step  up  there  and  see  about  it." 


XIX 

LATE  one  afternoon  Ogden  drew  down  his 
desk-top,  put  on  his  street-coat,  felt  in  his  pocket 
to  be  sure  that  Atwater's  tasteful  memorandum 
was  still  there,  and  took  the  elevator  up  to  the 
eighteenth  floor.  He  had  been  as  conscious  of 
that  memorandum  all  through  the  day  as  he 
would  have  been  of  a  mustard-plaster.  On  tak 
ing  it  out  and  recreasing  its  immaculate  folds  he 
almost  felt  as  if  he  were  about  to  dispute  a  debt 
of  honor. 

Atwater  was  in,  but  he  was  completely  taken 
up  in  radiating  his  careful  affability  upon  some 
promising  clients  who  wanted  not  only  doors  but 
the  house  that  went  with  them.  Ogden  got  no 
closer  to  him  than  to  secure  the  attention  of  the 
clerk  whose  duty  it  was  to  mediate  between  the 
contractors  and  the  plans  they  were  to  follow. 

He  was  an  alert,  nervous  young  man,  with  a 
big  shock  of  unruly  hair  and  a  pair  of  large,  lu 
minous  eyes  behind  his  hooked  and  shimmering 
spectacles.  He  ran  his  long,  lean?  inky  fingers 
through  his  hair,  and  transferred  his  wide  eyes 
from  the  memorandum  to  the  man  who  had 
brought  it  in. 


246 


"  No,"  he  said  presently ;  "  it's  all  right— there's 
no  mistake.  Mr.  Atwater  took  a  good  deal  of 
interest  in  this  work.  He  sketched  out  some  of 
the  drawings  himself,  to  start  with,  and  he  even 
touched  up  a  few  of  them  to  finish  with." 

"  Touched  up  a  few  of  them  to  finish  with  ?" 
George  repeated,  inquiringly. 

"  Yes ;  he  don't  do  that  often.  When  he  does, 
it  makes  a  difference ;  it  ought  to." 

The  whole  matter  was  coming  to  assume  the 
aspect  of  a  personal  favor ;  it  was  a  debt  of 
honor,  after  all.  The  grocer,  the  upholsterer, 
and  the  rest  of  them  might  wait ;  it  would  give 
them  time  to  learn  the  value  of  an  elegant  "  pres 
ence"  and  the  compelling  force  of  personal  ac 
quaintance. 

The  doors,  hung  and  paid  for,  swung  open 
many  times  during  the  following  winter  and 
spring,  to  admit  people  whom,  as  his  wife  as 
sured  him,  it  was  an  advantage  to  know.  He 
became  conscious  that  she  was  actuated  by  mo 
tives  quite  different  from  his,  and  that  she  had 
a  standard  quite  at  variance  from  any  that  he 
himself  would  have  set  up.  She  strained  for 
people  that  he  would  not  have  turned  his  hand 
for.  Most  of  these  had  familiar  names,  and  it 
sometimes  seemed  to  him  as  if  many  of  them 
had  had  their  place  in  the  social  yearnings  of 
Cornelia  McNabb.  Certainly,  his  wife's  atti 
tude  was  quite  different  from  that  of  the  Floyds, 


247 


who  had  been  disposed  to  pooh-pooh  quietly  al 
most  everybody,  and  also  from  that  of  her  own 
parents,  who  simply  accepted  the  circle  that 
chance  and  association  had  formed  for  them, 
and  met  everybody  on  the  same  dead  level  of 
good-will. 

During  Lent  his  wife  arranged  a  small  musi- 
cale ;  another  Mary  Munson  had  arrived  —  this 
time  from  Cincinnati.  The  names  of  the  per 
formers  included  only  those  of  amateurs  of  the 
better  sort  —  since  she  knew  that  good  profes 
sional  services  were  quite  beyond  her  reach ; 
yet  chairs,  awning,  and  refreshments  called  for 
the  expense  of  outside  supervision.  The  morn 
ing  before  it  she  put  a  slip  of  paper  into  his 
hands. 

"You  are  going  right  past  the  Tribune. 
Won't  you  just  leave  this  with  them  ?" 

It  was  an  announcement  of  her  musicale.  It 
included  a  list  of  names  —  not  those  of  the  per 
formers,  but  those  of  the  listeners. 

"  All  old  friends — in  print,"  her  husband  com 
mented.  "  What  do  you  care  for  these  people  ? 
Why  don't  you  ask  the  Fairchilds  ?  —  they're 
quiet,  but  they're  nice ;  and  they  like  music. 
Why  don't  you  have  your  father  and  mother? 
I  haven't  seen  either  of  them  for  a  month." 

His  wife  writhed  delicately  in  protest.  Her 
winter  had  increased  her  paleness.  The  blue 
veins  were  bluer  in  her  temples ;  her  large  eyes 


248 

looked  larger  yet,  and  there  were  faint  circles 
under  them. 

"Well,  Cecilia  doesn't  fancy  Mrs.  Fairchikl 
very  much,  in  the  first  place — " 

George  bit  his  lip.  By  the  curious  workings 
of  chance  he  had  never  yet  seen  Cecilia  Ingles, 
but  he  no  longer  joked  about  her  non-actuality. 
She  appeared  to  be  looming  up  as  the  great 
power  in  his  household. 

"  — and  besides,"  she  proceeded,  "  who  would 
recognize  their  names  if  they  saw  them  in 
print  ?" 

George  stood  like  a  looker-on  at  a  transforma 
tion-scene,  before  whose  eyes  the  gauze  veils  are 
lifted  one  by  one  in  slow  succession. 

"  Oh,  then,"  he  said,  and  less  in  jest  than  in 
earnest,  "  there  is  no  use  in  enjoying  ourselves 
unless  we  put  it  in  the  papers,  and  no  use  of  put 
ting  it  in  the  papers  unless  we  can  give  a  list  of 
names,  and  no — 

"Now,  George  !"     She  flushed  with  vexation. 

" —  and  no  use  of  putting  in  a  list  of  names 
unless  they  are  names  that  will  be  generally  rec 
ognized.  Well,  that  does  cut  out  the  Fairchilds, 
and  your  poor  mother,  too.  And  mine."  He 
looked  at  her  narrowly. 

"  Now,  George,"  she  cried  again,  "  how  can 
you  be  so  disagreeable?  You  know  papa  and 
mamma  wouldn't  care  anything  for  this;  nor 
your  mother,  either.  And  it  isn't  the  only  thing 


249 


I'm  ever  going  to  have.  I  can  ask  her  yet, 
though,  if  you  want  me  to." 

"  Oh,  fiddlesticks !  Only  don't  lose  your  head. 
Here ;  give  me  that  precious  notice.  Perhaps, 
before  long,  people  who  are  after  names  will  be 
just  as  anxious  to  get  yours." 

"  You  silly  boy !"  she  cried,  striking  him 
lightly  across  the  shoulder.  But  she  was  pleased 
and  gratified  by  this,  and  she  was  not  able  to 
conceal  it. 

Following  Lent  there  was  the  usual  social  after 
math.  For  Mrs.  George  Milward  Ogden  the 
major  stress  of  the  season  was  over,  but  she 
gave  a  few  luncheons,  and  she  went  to  a  good 
many  others.  These  little  functions  sent  dozens 
of  ladies  tripping  through  the  raw  winds  and 
the  slushy  streets  of  spring.  The  lake,  weltering 
under  the  gray  skies  of  March,  dashed  its  vicious 
sprays  high  over  the  sea-wall,  and  sent  its  cruel 
blasts  gashingly  through  the  streets  that  ended 
on  its  confines.  And  at  such  signals  asthma  and 
bronchitis  and  pneumonia  dug  their  clutching 
fingers  into  the  throats  and  lungs  of  thousands 
of  tender  sufferers. 

Jessie's  supplementary  doings  were  of  too  in 
formal  a  nature  to  demand  the  entrance  of  out 
side  help,  but  at  the  same  time  they  were  of  a 
kind  to  lay  the  maximum  strain  upon  the  small 
and  simply  organized  household  which  was  all 
that  her  husband  was  as  yet  able  to  maintain. 


250 


About  every  so  often  the  domestic  tension 
overtook  the  breaking-point.  An  interregnum 
would  follow,  and  then  a  change  of  dynasty. 
The  blame  for  these  economic  hitches  George 
\vas  obliged  to  distribute  with  an  even  hand. 
He  acknowledged  frankly  the  mere  muddishness 
of  most  of  the  peasant  material  that  oozed  in 
and  out  of  his  kitchen ;  but  he  was  also  obliged 
to  recognize  the  utter  tactlessness  of  his  wife 
and  the  folly  of  her  unguarded  exhibitions  of 
conscious  superiority.  She  had  never  before 
been  able  to  issue  directions  to  two  servants, 
and  she  had  never  acquired  the  practical  ex 
perience  necessary  for  the  control  of  even  one. 
She  referred  to  her  servants  in  their  own  hear 
ing  as  servants ;  and  this  did  not  seem  to  her 
as  inconsiderate  from  the  point  of  humanity  or 
unwise  as  a  mere  matter  of  policy. 

The  burden  of  this  fell  principally  upon  her 
husband.  He  was  obliged  now  and  then  to 
temporize  with  an  indignant  cook  to  secure  a 
dinner  for  the  evening;  on  one  occasion  he  em 
ployed  all  his  finesse  to  effect  without  scandal 
the  removal  of  a  frantic  chamber-maid ;  and  he 
became  more  familiarly  known  to  the  intelli 
gence  offices  than  he  had  ever  expected  to  be. 
His  wife  was  manifestly  incapable  of  keeping  a 
house,  and  he  was  committed  to  housekeeping 
for  a  year  to  come. 

March  passed  and  April  came.     One  evening 


251 


they  sat  together  in  their  little  parlor.  The 
weather  outside  was  raw  and  rainy,  and  not  all 
of  its  chill  could  be  kept  out  by  the  grate-fire 
over  which  Jessie  was  cowering  and  shivering. 
She  wore  a  fleecy  wrap  on  which  her  thin  fingers 
took  a  sinuous  clutch,  and  she  was  nursing  a 
cold  whose  sniffling  discomfort  seemed  passing 
into  an  obstinate  cough.  She  was  running  over 
the  newspaper  carelessly. 

"  I  see  Mayme  Brainard's  mother  has  just 
died,"  she  said  presently.  "'On  the  eighth  of 
April,  at  her  residence ' — and  all  that — l  Abigail 
Brainard,  aged  fifty-six  years.'  Wasn't  she  any 
older  than  that  ?  Well,  I  suppose  not.  ISTo  great 
change  for  her,  is  it  ?" 

"  What  did  she  die  of?" 

"  Oh,  it  was  her  lungs.  It's  a  wonder  that 
anybody  lives  through  these  springs.  I  can't 
think  why  we  ever  got  so  close  to  the  lake  as 
this.  I  don't  feel  sure  of  getting  through  an 
other  winter  here  myself." 

She  leaned  forward  to  stir  the  fire,  and  then 
lay  back,  coughing. 

"  I  suppose  they'll  let  Mayme  come  home,  now 
—  for  the  funeral,  anyway.  I  wonder  if  she'll 
bring  the  baby ;  he  swears  he  won't  see  it.  Cor 
nelia  says  it's  a  pretty  little  thing  —  Abbie  was 
down  there  a  month  ago." 

George  stared  at  the  fire  thoughtfully,  and 
reached  mechanically  for  the  poker. 


252 


"  I  don't  know  how  they  will  feel,  now,  about 
staying  in  that  house,"  she  went  on.  "  Cornelia 
wants  to  move  the  whole  family  over  here,  but 
Abbie  won't  listen  to  her.  I  don't  know  whether 
she  likes  her  own  part  of  town,  but  she  seems  to 
have  taken  a  strong  dislike  to  this.  Anyway, 
she  has  never  come  near  me,  for  all  you  helped 
them  at  her  brother's  wedding.  Cornelia  ap 
pears  to  think  everything  of  her,  though,  and  I 
guess  she  likes  Cornelia  quite  a  little.  Funny, 
isn't  it,  that  those  two —  Goodness,  George, 
don't  knock  the  fire  all  to  pieces.  Here ;  let  me 
have  it." 

She  took  the  poker  from  him. 

"  Dear  me,  what  a  miserable  flue !"  She  looked 
at  him  discontentedly,  as  she  settled  back  weari 
ly  in  her  big  chair.  "  And  we've  really  got  this 
house  on  our  hands  for  a  whole  year  more  ?" 
She  seemed  to  feel  in  this  one  year  the  weight 
of  eternity. 

"  That's  what  the  lease  says,"  he  responded, 
soberly.  "  What  do  you  say  ?"  his  eyes  seemed 
to  ask. 

She  spoke  her  thoughts  presently  and  at  some 
length.  She  proposed  giving  up  the  house  on 
the  first  of  May.  Was  it  a  passing  caprice  or  a 
serious  desire  ?  he  wondered. 

"  Shall  you  take  your  porch  and  your  doors 
with  you  ?"  he  asked,  with  a  sorry  smile.  "  They 
cost  enough  to  be  worth  considering." 


253 


"  No,"  she  answered,  with  the  simple  liter- 
alness  that  builds  a  stone  wall  in  a  moment. 
"  We  shouldn't  need  them  in  an  apartment- 
house." 

"  That's  the  idea,  is  it?" 

"  Yes,  it  strikes  me  that  that  would  be  the 
best  thing  all  around — an  apartment-house,  with 
a  cafe  or  something.  Lots  of  nice  people  live 
that  way  now.  Look  at  Cecilia  Ingles's  cousin ; 
she  is  invited  everywhere,  and  she  entertains 
just  the  same  as  if  she  was  in  her  own  house. 
It's  too  hard  work  for  me  to  run  things  like  this, 
and  I've  just  got  to  get  farther  away  from  this 
miserable  lake." 

"  There's  all  the  furniture." 

"  We  could  use  some  of  it." 

"  And  store  the  rest  ?" 

"  Yes — or  auction  it." 

"  Small  profit  in  either.  What  are  you  going 
to  do  with  the  lease  ?  Store  it,  or  auction  it,  or 
use  it  for  furnishing  ?" 

Her  lip  quivered  sensitively.  "  Why,  I  sup 
posed  - 

"  Yes,  we  can  sublet  the  house — if  anybody  is 
found  to  take  it.  There  was  something  of  a 
wait  before  we  took  it.  There  might  be  an- 
other." 

"There's  that  Mrs.  Cass— " 

"  I  don't  know  how  much  she  could  do  in 
three  weeks  —  a  good  many  people  are  fixed  by 


254 


this  time.  Two  weeks  sooner  would  have  made 
some  difference.  I  couldn't  very  well  afford  to 
carry  the 'house  all  through  the  summer.  There's 
a  bottom  to  our  pocket-book,  and  we  are  getting 
to  it  faster  than  you  think." 

This  was  a  figure  of  speech  that  called  for  no 
direct  response.  For — 

"Well,"  she  went  on,  "  that's  my  idea :  a  flat, 
with  our  meals.  This  would  give  me  my  chance 
to  get  away  for  a  part  of  the  summer — I'm  sure 
I  need  it." 

"  Away  for  a  part  of  the  summer  ?" 

"  Yes.  Mary  Munson  was  saying  something 
about  my  going  to  the  White  Mountains  with 
her  in  July.  They  would  do  me  good.  Though 
perhaps  the  sea-shore  might  be  better ;  plenty 
of  those  Down-east  people  are  indebted  to  me 
now." 

Another  of  those  gauze  veils  was  lifting.  Mar 
ried  life  was  but  a  prolongation  of  girlhood,  with 
all  its  associations  and  peregrinations.  Where 
did  the  husband  come  in  ? 

They  left  the  house  on  the  first  of  May. 
George  recognized  by  this  time  the  essential 
slightness  and  incapacity  of  his  wife,  and  re 
nounced  the  possibility  of  a  home  in  any  but  a 
modified  sense.  Part  of  their  goods  were  sacri 
ficed  at  auction,  part  were  stored  at  a  rate  that 
would  have  provided  a  home  for  a  working-man's 
family,  a  few  pieces  were  utilized  in  filling  up  a 


255 


partly  furnished  flat,  and  the  deserted  house 
remained  vacant  through  the  summer.  It  was 
not  until  October  that  its  ornate  front  and  its 
tasteful  decorations  caught  the  eye  of  the  right 
man,  and  by  October  a  complication  of  inter 
ests  had  made  a  vacant  house  the  very  least 
of  Ogden's  concerns. 

The  place  came  under  the  consideration  of  the 
Floyds  as  soon  as  the  intentions  of  the  Ogdens 
became  known.  A  decided  change  had  come 
over  Walworth's  affairs ;  a  less  expensive  house 
than  his  present  one  now  seemed  a  great  advan 
tage.  But  his  own  lease  ran  for  a  year  more  ; 
besides,  his  wife  had  too  high  an  idea  of  their 
position  and  its  dues  to  think  of  succeeding  the 
young  Ogdens  in  such  a  tenancy.  The  Floyds, 
as  a  matter  of  fact,  were  sinking  to  bed-rock — 
a  foothold  whose  reality  they  had  never  tested 
yet ;  and  there  need  be  no  wonder  that  the  be 
ginning  of  their  downward  course  was  marked 
by  a  slow  reluctance.  Walworth  endeavored  to 
make  good  the  shortages  occasioned  through  his 
brother's  clippings  by  intrusting  Ann  with  com 
missions  on  his  behalf  upon  the  Open  Board — 
affairs  in  which  she  was  no  more  successful  for 
him  than  for  herself;  while  his  wife,  for  the  first 
time,  made  some  efforts  in  a  society  for  which 
she  had  always  had  a  shade  of  careless  con 
tempt. 

The  Ogdens  established  themselves  anew  in  a 


256 


large  building  where  they  had  four  or  five  small 
rooms,  and  where  they  could  breakfast  and  dine 
with  a  few  hundred  persons  of  like  requirements 
and  like  situation.  George  now  began  renewed 
efforts  to  turn  to  account  the  property  for  which 
he  had  received  deeds  from  McDowell.  His  half- 
year  of  married  life  had  put  him  in  an  awkward 
and  straitened  position,  and  the  usual  activity 
in  real  property  that  comes  with  the  spring  was 
something  of  which  the  utmost  advantage  must 
be  taken. 

He  placed  some  of  his  outside  acres  with  one 
or  two  good  houses,  but  this  entire  side  of  busi 
ness  seemed  pervaded  by  apathy. 

"It's  going  to  be  an  off-year,"  he  was  told. 
"  Acres  are  down,  and  it  looks  as  if  they  were 
going  to  stay  so — for  some  time,  anyway.  We'll 
take  this,  though,  and  do  what  we  can.  You 
pay  this  year's  taxes,  of  course  ?" 

So  much  for  the  real  estate.  McDowell's 
notes,  which  he  had  made  to  run  for  a  longer 
term  than  pleased  anybody  but  himself,  showed 
the  due  and  prompt  endorsement  of  interest  pay 
ments  ;  and  if  there  was  anything  else  in  the 
general  situation  to  call  for  gratulation  Ogden 
failed  to  discover  it. 


XX 

JESSIE  OGDEN'S  supposition  with  regard  to 
Mary  Brainard  was  justified  by  events ;  the 
poor  exile  was  allowed  to  come  back  to  town 
to  attend  her  mother's  funeral,  and,  thanks  to 
a  providential  escort,  she  was  enabled  to  bring 
her  child  with  her.  The  two  arrived  under  the 
charge  of  a  distant  relative  by  marriage  of  the 
Centralia  Brainards,  who  was  understood  to  be 
on  the  point  of  visiting  the  city  anyway,  for  the 
purpose  of  "  buying  goods."  He  was  presented 
by  the  name  of  Briggs. 

He  was  a  somewhat  uncouth  and  slovenly 
man  of  thirty-five  —  a  fair  specimen  of  the  type 
evolved  by  the  small  towns  of  southern  Illinois. 
But  he  had  a  bright  and  capable  way  with  him, 
and  it  seemed  likely  enough  that  if  he  were  to 
transfer  himself  and  his  business  to  Chicago,  as 
he  once  spoke  of  doing,  he  might  work  himself 
up  into  pretty  fair  shape.  He  was  a  widower. 

He  showed  some  fitting  sense  of  the  solemnity 
of  the  occasion  that  had  brought  him  to  the 
house;  but  it  was  fair  to  surmise  from  various 
tokens  that  his  usual  treatment  of  the  subdued 
young  mother  was  in  the  line  of  familiar  kind- 
17 


258 


ness,  which  only  genuine  solicitude  kept  apart 
from  semi -jocularity  —  a  jocularity  that  had  al 
most  the  effect  of  an  understanding.  He  seemed 
to  have  about  the  same  understanding  with  the 
baby ;  he  had  held  it  part  of  the  time  on  the 
train,  and  he  had  shown  a  willingness  to  be  use 
ful  in  the  same  direction  subsequently. 

Brainard  saw  the  child  once.  He  looked  at 
the  boy's  dark  hair  and  eyes  and  vented  a  dread 
ful  oath,  and  signified  that  while  he  and  his 
mother  were  in  the  house  the  infant  must  be 
kept  out  of  sight  and  out  of  sound. 

Abbie  Brainard  made  no  effort  towards  further 
mediation  between  her  father  and  her  sister. 
The  present  status  was  endurable,  and  there  was 
little  to  be  gained  by  additional  appeal  to  the 
irascible  old  man ;  it  was  irascibility  rather  than 
sorrow  which  now  possessed  him.  Nothing  irri 
tated  him  more  than  an  address  to  the  deeper 
emotions,  and  the  passing  of  his  life-long  partner 
was  an  address  of  this  character.  And  this  iras 
cibility  had  risen  to  a  pitch  of  fury  on  account 
of  the  unfortunate  resemblance  of  Mary  Yibert's 
child  to  its  father. 

Abbie  was  still  leading  her  old  life  in  her  old 
way.  She  had  her  reading,  her  accounts,  her 
church -work;  but  she  went  at  these  with  less 
energy  than  she  had  shown  a  year  ago.  She  had 
lost  something  in  flesh  and  something  in  spirits, 
but  nothing  was  slighted.  She  had  no  confidants 
and  she  made  no  moan. 


259 


"What  is  the  matter  with  her?"  Cornelia 
would  now  and  then  ask  herself.  "  If  she  would 
only  rip  out  and  say  something ;  but  I  never  saw 
a  girl  who  was  so  mum.  I'll  get  her  out  of  this 
place,  though,  if  anybody  can.  She  has  got  to 
come  up  there  and  live  with  me.  I'll  fetch  that, 
if  I  have  to  pull  her  up  by  the  roots." 

And  then,  putting  generalization  in  the  place 
of  any  tangible  particulars,  "  I  believe  she's  just 
starving  " — which  was  not  altogether  wrong. 

Cornelia  found  no  specific  grounds  for  ap 
proaching  her  father-in-law  about  Abbie,  but  she 
had  some  words  with  him  about  Abbie's  sister. 

She  went  to  him  one  evening  in  his  den ;  it 
was  the  day  after  the  funeral.  The  distant  wail 
ing  of  the  baby's  voice  had  caused  him  to  shut 
the  door  of  his  little  room  with  a  profane  slam. 

"  Mr.  Briggs  is  right  there  in  the  parlor,"  she 
said  to  him  boldly,  "  waiting  for  her  to  come 
down ;  I  don't  see  that  it's  going  to  help  things 
any  to  slam  doors.  If  he  don't  mind  the  baby,  I 
guess  we  don't  have  to." 

He  turned  upon  her  fiercely  and  half  rose 
from  his  chair.  It  seemed  for  a  moment  as  if  he 
was  intending  to  put  her  out  of  the  room. 

But  she  stood  her  ground  and  stared  him  full 
in  the  face.  She  was  the  only  one  in  the  family 
who,  when  the  real  pinch  came,  could  look  him 
down.  He  fell  back  in  his  seat  and  fixed  an  un 
certain  eye  upon  the  panels  of  the  door. 


260 


"  There's  such  a  thing  as  sense  at  such  places 
as  this,  if  you'd  only  know  it,"  she  went  on. 
She  spoke  out  loudly ;  she  knew  that  if  she  used 
a  moderate  voice  her  tones  would  tremble.  "  I 
should  think  we  might  hold  in  for  the  day  or  so 
that  the  man's  here.  He  knows  why  she  was 
sent  off  down  there,  and  that's  bad  enough ;  but 
it's  worse  for  him  to  bring  her  up  here  and  have 
her  treated  bad  right  before  his  face.  Why  can't 
you  speak  to  her  at  table?  "Why  can't  you 
have — 

"That  will  do,  Cornelia."  He  beat  on  the 
arm  of  his  chair  with  his  doubled-up  fist.  "  We 
won't  have  anything  more  of  this  sort  of  thing. 
That  will  do." 

But  there  was  a  kind  of  harsh  grin  on  his 
face  ;  he  either  admired  her  pluck  or  anticipated 
her  point.  She  saw  this  and  knew  that  she  held 
him  in  her  hand. 

"ISTo,  it  won't  do,  Cornelia  —  not  yet.  Why 
do  you  think  he  is  here  ?  Do  you  suppose  a 
man  goes  travelling  around  the  country  with  a 
woman  and  a  three  months'  old  baby  for  the  fun 
of  it?  And  he  hasn't  come  up  to  '  buy  goods  ' 
—  don't  you  believe  it.  This  is  a  great  chance 
for  Mayme,  everything  considered.  He's  a 
smart  fellow,  and  you  don't  want  to  go  and 
spoil  it  all.  This  is  a  thing  that  will  take  care 
of  itself,  if  you'll  only  give  it  a  show." 

He  stared  at  her  —  still  rather  forbiddingly. 


261 


But  she  saw  admiration  appearing  through  in 
dignation,  and  she  judged  that  it  was  gaining 
the  upper  hand. 

"  Now,"  she  said,  with  her  own  hand  on  the 
door  -  knob,  "  when  yoi*  ask  May  me  to-morrow 
morning  if  she  would  like  another  piece  of 
steak,  I  want  you  to  look  at  her ;  seems  to  me 
this  is  a  time  when  a  family  should  act  like  a 
family.  And  I  guess  it  wouldn't  hurt  you  much 
to  put  yourself  out  far  enough  to  ask  that  man  to 
smoke  a  cigar  with  you.  You  try.  And  I  think 
this  door  had  better  stay  the  way  I  leave  it." 

She  passed  out,  leaving  the  door  open.  And 
open  it  remained. 

In  such  fashion  as  this  came  Mary  Brainard 
to  her  mother's  burial.  But  her  younger  brother 
came  not,  and  no  one  knew  where  he  was  or 
what  he  might  be  doing. 

Briggs  left  for  Centralia  on  the  following 
evening,  his  charges  remaining  behind,  by  an 
inconclusive  arrangement  that  might  terminate 
in  almost  any  way.  Cornelia,  who  attended  his 
departure  with  a  lively  interest,  noticed  that 
Abbie,  in  her  hat  and  cloak,  was  trying  to  take 
advantage  of  this  same  occurrence  to  steal  out 
of  the  house.  She  followed  her  through  the 
vestibule  and  overtook  her  half  way  down  the 
steps. 

"  Abbie !"  she  called  after  her,  "  where  are 
you  going  ?" 


"  'Sh  !"  Abbie  said,  softly.  "  I'm  just  going 
out  for  a  few  minutes." 

"Neighbors?" 

"  No,  not  exactly,"  the  girl  hesitated.  "  I'm 
just  going  a  block  or  two." 

"  You  don't  want  to  be  trotting  around  alone 
this  time  of  night.  Sha'n't  I  go  with  you  P 

She  placed  her  hand  on  Abbie's  arm  to  draw 
her  back  while  she  put  on  her  own  things.  She 
felt  her  companion  tremble,  and  saw  an  expres 
sion  of  anxiety  on  her  face  which  she  took  to 
mean  embarrassment. 

"  No,  Cornelia,  I  don't  want  you  to  go  with 
me.  I  don't  need  you,  I've  got  to  go  alone." 

"  Upon  my  word,  I  think  you're  acting  mighty 
queer.  I  just  believe,  Abbie  Brainard,  that  you 
are  going  out  to  meet  somebody  —  you,  of  all 
people !" 

Abbie  started.  "  Supposing  I  am  ?"  she  stam 
mered. 

"  Who  is  it  ?"  asked  Cornelia,  peremptorily. 
Only  an  extremely  eager  interest  would  have 
made  her  take  this  tone  with  Abbie.  "  Well,  I 
must  say,  I  think  your  father  is  a  little  too  bad. 
Why  can't  he  see  that  girls  have  got  to  be  girls? 
First  it's  Mayme  and  now  it's — 

"  Cornelia  !"  cried  Abbie,  with  a  violent  blush 
and  the  trembling  voice  that  foreshadows  tears. 
"  It's  my  brother !  It's  Marcus !" 

"  Marcus  !"  exclaimed  Cornelia.     "  Then  I  am 


263 


going,  sure.  Where  are  you  to  meet  him — in 
the  park  ?" 

Abbie  bowed  assent. 

"  Well,  then,  you  wait  one  second.  I'll  be 
right  out  again." 

"  Don't  come.  He  won't  speak  to  me  if  he 
sees  anybody  with  me." 

"  I  can  stand  around  somewhere — I  won't  do 
any  harm." 

She  was  actuated  as  much  by  curiosity  as  by 
sympathy.  She  had  never  seen  Marcus,  but  she 
remembered  the  "  erring  son  "  of  her  first  play, 
and  nothing  more  than  one's  first  play  has  a 
fixed  footing  in  one's  association  of  ideas. 

The  park  lay  under  the  cold  glare  of  the  elec 
tric  light,  in  the  state  of  forbidding  bareness  that 
overtakes  all  such  urban  tracts  during  the  ear 
lier  days  of  spring.  Soggy  footprints  showed 
everywhere  in  the  soaked  brown  turf  that  bor 
dered  the  winding  paths,  and  masses  of  dead 
leaves  were  matted  together  at  the  roots  of  the 
spindling  shrubbery.  The  arc -lights  threw  a 
ghastly  illumination  on  the  flat  white  fronts  of 
the  houses  that  stood  around  in  rows  outside  as 
well  as  on  the  stretches  of  theatrical  posters 
which  filled  up  the  spaces  between ;  and  they 
flung  deep  shadows  into  the  flimsy  arbors  and 
kiosks  that  started  up  here  and  there  within. 
Abbie,  with  her  companion,  traversed  a  number 
of  spongy,  gravelled  paths,  and  presently  the 


264 


figure  of  a  man  emerged  from  a  summer-house 
and  advanced  to  meet  her.  Cornelia  turned  off, 
and  paused  behind  the  thickened  stalks  of  a 
bare  bush. 

"  Marcus !"  cried  Abbie,  as  her  brother  moved 
towards  her,  "  Marcus,  why  didn't  you  come  ?  I 
waited  at  the  door  to  let  you  in.  Could  any 
body  have  made  any  trouble  at  such  a  time  as 
that?" 

He  came  up  to  her  with  a  few  unsteady  steps. 
His  eyes  were  blood-shot,  and  on  his  face,  which 
seemed  paler  and  thinner  than  ever  under  the 
white  flood  from  the  globe  overhead,  there  was 
a  long,  half-healed  scar.  He  looked  at  her  in 
a  dull,  dazed  way ;  perhaps  he  simply  misappre 
hended  these  present  words,  perhaps  he  was 
unable  to  fully  comprehend  any  words  at  all. 

"  You  could  have  gone  in  a  carriage  all  alone 
with  me,"  she  went  on,  in  pitiful  reproach. 
"  And  you  could  have  stayed  in  it — you  needn't 
have  seen  anybody  else  at  all.  I  wanted  you 
so  much.  Mayme  came ;  why  couldn't  you  ? 
Oh,  Marcus,  you  were  thought  of ;  your  name 
was  almost  the  last  one  said." 

She  threw  her  head  on  his  shoulder  and  burst 
into  tears.  He  gave  way  a  little,  and  then,  with 
an  effort,  he  mastered  a  steadier  pose. 

Her  crape  brushed  his  face ;  he  felt  it,  rather 
than  saw  it. 

"Is  he  dead?"      Something  like  light  came 


265 


into  his  dull  eye.  The  lamp  above  gave  a 
sudden  vast  flicker,  and  the  long  scar  on  his  face 
deepened  and  lengthened  and  came  back  to  it 
self  again.  It  was  all  like  a  sinister  and  cynical 
smile. 

"  Marcus !  don't  you  know  ?  Where  have  you 
been  ?  Haven't  you  got  any  of  my  letters  ?" 

He  leaned  against  the  silly  rusticity  of  the 
summer-house,  and  looked  at  her  with  a  dazed 
but  inquiring  eye. 

"It's  mother!  It's  mother!"  the  poor  girl 
cried.  "  Why  didn't  you  come  ?" 

"  Why,  how  is  this  ?"  asked  Cornelia,  stepping 
forward.  «  Hadn't  he  heard «" 

"  I  mailed  them  to  the  same  place.  And  the 
money — didn't  you  get  that,  either  ?" 

He  looked  at  her  steadily  and  soberly,  but 
his  eyes  had  a  heavy  droop.  "  It's  mother,"  he 
said  at  length  ;  "  it's  mother  that's  dead."  He 
sat  down  carefully  on  the  steps  of  the  summer- 
house.  "  And  my  name  was  the  last.  Always 
the  last,  Abbie.  When  was  it  ?" 

"Has  he  moved  —  do  you  suppose?"  asked 
Cornelia.  She  regarded  him  long  and  steadily. 
She  seemed  about  to  recognize  him  —  though 
voice  was  apparently  counting  for  more  than 
face. 

"  It  was  only  day  before  yesterday,"  Abbie 
said.  "  I  tried  to  see  you,  but  it  was  so  far  and 
there  was  so  much  to  do.  But  I  sent  you  word." 


266 


"  I  haven't  been  there  lately,"  he  said  slowly. 
"  I  couldn't  have  come  day  before  yesterday," 
he  added  presently. 

"Where  have  I  seen  him  before?"  thought 
Cornelia.  And,  "  What  is  the  matter  with  him  ?" 
she  seemed  to  ask  of  Abbie. 

"  I  couldn't  come,"  he  repeated.  "  I'm  sorry," 
he  added  humbly.  "  I  was — somewhere  else." 

"  Have  you  been  away  all  these  three  months? 
I  haven't  seen  you  since  almost  New  Year's. 
Have  you  been  away  from  the  city  all  this 
time?" 

"  I  have  been  somewhere  —  somewhere  else," 
he  repeated  thickly.  He  rose  tremblingly.  "  I 
suppose  they'll  have  me  there  again,  some  time. 
Well,  all  right,"  he  said,  with  resignation. 

"  What  does  he  mean  ?"  asked  Abbie,  turning 
appealingly  to  Cornelia. 

Marcus  followed  his  sister's  eyes.  He  looked 
at  Cornelia  narrowly,  his  own  eyes  half  closed. 
"  Who  is  this  ?"  he  asked. 

"  It's  Cornelia— Burt's  wife." 

"  Burt's  wife  ?"  He  held  her  with  an  enig 
matical  stare.  "  I  have  seen  her,"  he  said ; 
"  before." 

"  Where  ?"  thought  Cornelia.  "  JSTot  possibly 
at — the  theatre  ?" 

"  In  church,"  he  explained,  with  a  slow  gravi 
ty.  "  He  isn't  dead— Burt  S" 

"  Dead  ?"  cried  Cornelia.     "  No,  indeed." 


267 


"  No,  he  isn't  dead,"  Marcus  repeated  deliber 
ately.  His  eyelids  raised  themselves.  "  He  is 
married;  he  has  half  a  million,"  he  went  on, 
with  the  same  slowness.  His  eye  lighted  up 
with  a  malignant  glare.  -"No,  he  isn't  dead. 
But—" 

He  stretched  himself  aloft,  and  thrust  out  his 
arm,  and  staggered,  and  only  half -saved  himself. 

"  — but  I  will  kill  him,"  he  added  suddenly. 

"Marcus!"  his  sister  screamed;  "are  you 
mad  3" 

He  lay  slantingly  against  the  corner  of  the 
summer-house.  His  arm  caught  at  the  cross- 
pieces  of  the  rustic  carpentry,  and  he  hung 
there  panting.  Presently  a  little  stream  of 
blood  began  to  trickle  across  the  palm  of  his 
hand — he  had  torn  himself  on  a  nail.  He  felt 
the  warm  fluid  on  his  skin,  and  held  up  his  hand 
to  his  own  curious  and  impersonal  inspection. 

"  Give  me  your  handkerchief,  Cornelia,"  Abbie 
implored  pitifully.  She  folded  her  own  and  laid 
Cornelia's  over  it,  and  twisted  it  around  his 
thumb  and  tied  it  over  his  wrist. 

His  fingers  felt  thin  and  claw-like,  and  there 
was  a  grime  rubbed  into  their  cracked  and 
roughened  skin — those  girlish  fingers  (his  moth 
er's  fingers)  that  had  once  held  a  pencil  so  deli 
cately. 

"I  have  seen  her  —  before,"  he  repeated. 
"Here."  He  jerked  his  hand  out  of  his  sister's 


268 

hold  and  waved  it  over  the  circumscribed  and 
shabby  landscape.  The  light  shimmered  on  the 
leaden  surface  of  the  pond  behind  them,  and  the 
wind  rustled  the  stark  weeds  along  its  muddy 
edges.  "  I  knew  it  was  coming."  Abbie  caught 
his  hand  back.  "  Half  a  million ;  he  never  did 
anything  for  me.  I  will  kill  him"  he  muttered 
faintly. 

Cornelia  continued  her  inspection  of  him. 
"  Abbie,  just  look  at  these  clothes,  will  you  ? 
And  he  hasn't  got  any  cuffs  on,  either." 

"  Marcus  !"  his  sister  called  appealingly.  Her 
raised  voice  indicated  that,  after  all,  she  must 
acknowledge  him  as  other  than  himself.  "  All 
that  money  I  sent  you — you  need  it.  Go  right 
away  to-morrow  to  your  old  number  and  get 
it."  She  turned  to  Cornelia.  "I  haven't  got 
any  ;  have  you  ?  I  forgot  it,  after  all." 

"Just  this  half-dollar,"  she  answered.  "Ex 
actly  what  I  paid,"  she  said  to  herself,  "  to  see 
him  in  this  part  once  before."  She  recognized 
him  now ;  she  saw  that  she  had  been  interested 
in  the  new  actor  because  nobody  else  had  seemed 
so ;  and  she  felt  sure  that  his  attempt  on  the 
stage  had  been  the  same  brief  failure  that  all  of 
his  other  attempts  must  have  been  as  well. 

Marcus  raised  himself,  and  a  sly  smile  came 
over  his  face.  "Money?"  he  said.  "Keep  it. 
I  don't  want  it.  I  can  raise  all  I  need.  Yibert 
knew  the  ropes,  and  now  I  know  them  just  as 


269 

well  myself.  I  can  do  business  all  right  again. 
No  money,  Abbie ;  no."  lie  thrust  it  back  upon 
her.  "  He  always  said  I  wasn't^  for  business ; 
but  I'll  show  him." 

He  braced  himself  and  stepped  out  decidedly 
into  the  path.  He  turned  in  the  direction  of  the 
exit.  The  other  two  insensibly  took  this  direc 
tion  as  well,  and  fell  to  regulating  their  steps  by 
his. 

"  You  are  a  good  sister,  Abbie,"  he  said,  as 
they  passed  out.  "  You  have  been  good  to  me. 
Good."  He  put  his  hand  on  hers ;  he  had  for 
gotten  that  it  was  bandaged.  There  was  a  soft 
stringency  in  the  folds  of  the  handkerchiefs,  but 
she  felt  his  grateful  pulses  underneath. 

"  Oh,  Cornelia,"  moaned  poor  Abbie ;  "  I  must 
take  him  home — I  must — I  must !  So  near  at 
hand — and  the  place  where  he  ^belongs.  I  can't 
leave  him  to  go  wandering  around  like  this." 

Marcus  laid  his  bandaged  hand  on  his  sister's 
shoulder.  "  No,  Abbie."  The  earlier  waves  of 
a  sodden  stupor  now  seemed  to  be  washing  over 
him,  and  he  looked  on  the  two  girls  with  a  dull 
leer.  "Not  home.  Better  place  than  home. 
But  some  time — I  will  come  home  some  time. 
He  never  treated  me  as  well  as  he  did  Burt." 
His  tones  came  thickly.  "  I  will  kill  him,"  he 
murmured  softly  to  himself  in  a  drunken  con 
fidence. 

He   turned   off,  down  a  side  street.     Abbie 


270 

stood  watching  him  as  he  disappeared,  to  reap 
pear  in  the  light  of  frequent  lamp-posts.  Pres 
ently  he  turned  a  corner.  Abbie  clasped  her 
hand  tightly  in  her  companion's  and  allowed 
herself  to  be  led  home. 

"  Another  job  for  me,"  said  Cornelia,  thought 
fully. 


XXI 

THE  Ogdens,  in  their  apartment,  presented  to 
their  callers  substantially  the  same  aspect  that 
they  had  offered  in  a  complete  house,  save  that 
the  dining-room  had  been  lopped  off,  along  with 
the  kitchen.  They  were  a  shade  more  compact 
and,  if  anything,  a  shade  more  luxurious. 

Among  the  first  of  their  callers  here  was  the 
faithful  Brower.  As  he  lounged  back  in  a  famil 
iar  easy-chair  he  cast  his  eye  around  the  drawing- 
room  and  the  reception-hall;  he  recognized  a 
number  of  things  from  the  other  house,  and  de 
tected,  too,  a  good  many  novel  elegancies.  In 
one  corner  of  the  room,  in  particular,  there  stood 
a  delightful  little  tea-table ;  and  he  learned  that 
the  full  paraphernalia  of  the  delicate  function 
known  as  "a  tea"  could  be  produced  at  a  mo 
ment's  notice. 

On  the  purchase  of  this  adjunct  to  polite  liv 
ing  Jessie  had  brought  all  her  insistence  to  bear. 
Life  to  her  had  now  come  merely  to  mean  re 
ceiving  and  being  received ;  and  to  receive  at  all 
she  must  receive  correctly  and  elegantly. 

"  It's  about  all  I  feel  equal  to  doing  now- 
giving  teas,"  she  explained ;  "  and  that's  all  the 


272 


more  reason  why  I  should  do  it  properly.  Now, 
Cecilia  Ingles's  table  and  china — " 

"  For  Heaven's  sake,  Jessie,  please  to  remem 
ber  that  you  are  not  Mrs.  Ingles  and  that  I  am 
not  her  husband.  Can  you  expect  me  to  com 
pete  with  a  man  who  has  an  income  like  his? 
Do  you  know  what  that  building — that  building 
alone — pays  him  a  year  ?" 

"  Well,  I  only  want  things  nice.  I  shall  have 
to  live  quietly  for  a  while — I  don't  feel  as  if  I 
had  any  great  strength;  and  I  don't  think  I 
ought  to  be  denied  such  a  small  thing  as  this." 

Hence  the  charming  little  tea-table,  the  delicate 
and  exquisite  porcelain,  and  the  beautifully  bur 
nished  kettle ;  and  hence,  too,  the  cup  for  Brower, 
so  that  he  might  see  how  the  whole  thing  went. 
But  the  hand  that  passed  it  to  him  was  white 
and  tremulous,  and  the  graceful  bit  of  lace  over 
the  wrist  fluttered  with  a  pitiful  palpitation. 

"  I'm  going  to  put  another  lump  on  your  sau 
cer  ;  so  sorry  you  have  caught  us  without  a  lem 
on."  She  smiled  atf  him  as  she  spoke,  and  he 
could  not  but  see  that  her  lips  had  a  bluish  tinge. 
"  So  good  of  you  to  let  me  come  in  just  as  I  was." 
She  smoothed  down  the  fall  of  lace  along  the 
front  of  her  wrapper.  "  But  I  hardly  felt  equal 
to  dressing  this  evening ;  besides,  an  old  friend 
like  you — " 

The  "  old  friend "  went  home  and  talked 
things  over  with  his  room-mate. 


273 


He  lit  the  burners  on  both  sides  of  his  dress 
ing-case  mirror  and  slowly  took  off  his  coat. 
His  room-mate  was  in  his  shirt-sleeves,  too. 

"  I  wonder  if  he  is  happy,"  said  Brower, 
thoughtfully  running  his  thumb-nail  along  the 
teeth  of  his  tortoise-shell  comb. 

"  He  tried  hard  enough  to  be,"  answered  his 
room-mate,  running  his  thumb  along  the  teeth  of 
his  comb. 

Brower  sighed  and  looked  with  frank  but 
troubled  eyes  into  his  friend's  face.  "  Too  hard, 
perhaps." 

The  other  returned  his  glance  in  kind.  "  I'm 
afraid  so,"  he  breathed. 

"  He  figured  it  all  out  beforehand,"  said 
Brower.  "  We  talked  a  good  deal  on  the  sub 
ject  generally." 

"  That  sort  of  thing  doesn't  always  pay." 

"  We  considered  the  rich  girl  and  the  poor 
girl,"  Brower  went  on.  "But  there's  another 
kind  of  girl  that  we  both  failed  to  take  account 
of." 

"  What  kind  is  that?" 

"The  girl  in  very  moderate  circumstances 
who  has  spent  all  her  time  in  going  about 
among  wealthy  relatives  and  friends." 

"  The  poor  princess  who  makes  the  grand 
chain  of  other  people's  castles  ?" 

"  Yes,"  assented  Brower  ;  "  the  grand  chain  of 
other  people's  castles.    It's  demoralizing." 
18 


274 


"  Is  he  a  disappointed  man  ?" 

"Yes;  I'm  certain  of  it.  Disappointed,  and 
worried  half  to  death.  I'm  sorry  for  him.  I'm 
afraid  for  him." 

He  sat  down  on  the  edge  of  the  bed  and  be 
gan  to  unlace  his  shoes.  His  room-mate  wore 
shoes  of  the  same  size  and  laced  them  in  the 
same  way. 

"I  wonder,"  said  he,  "if  he  really  loved 
her?" 

"'ShP'saidBrower. 

"  Wasn't  there  another  one  that  he  did  love  ?" 

"  Not  a  word  more !"  cried  Brower. 

He  undressed  and  got  into  bed.  He  took  a 
book  with  him.  It  was  "  A  Mistaken  Marriage" 
— he  read  everything. 

"  What  do  you  want  to  read  for  ?"  asked  the 
other.  "It's  late." 

"  I  read  because  I  don't  want  to  think."  He 
opened  at  the  mark  and  settled  back  on  his  pil 
low  and  started  in. 

"  Where  are  you  now  ?"  demanded  his  double. 

"  Page  316 ;  the  castle's  on  fire." 

"  Do  you  want  anything  more  about  castles  ?" 

"  No." 

"  And  haven't  you  had  enough  of  fires  ?" 

"  Plenty." 

"Well,  then!" 

Out  went  the  gas,  and  sleep  presently  suc 
ceeded. 


275 


The  Ogclens  had  other  callers ;  among  them 
was  Frederick  Pratt. 

Frederick  had  left  the  Underground  for  the 
temple  at  the  extreme  end  of  the  street,  where 
he  was  engaged  in  an  ardent  study  of  puts  and 
calls.  The  atmosphere  of  the  Board  of  Trade  is 
less  sedate  than  that  of  the  clearing-house  asso 
ciation,  and  the  new  recruit  had  become  still 
more  volatile  and  giddy.  He  was  skating  on 
thinner  ice  and  was  putting  more  assurance  into 
his  movements. 

Pratt,  like  Brower,  made  his  own  observations 
on  the  new  status  of  the  Ogdens;  but  unlike 
Brower,  he  did  not  keep  his  opinions  and  con 
jectures  to  himself.  He  gave  the  same  currency 
to  his  reflections  on  this  pair  that  he  had  given 
to  those  on  the  Yiberts — and  among  others  thus 
favored  were  the  Floyds. 

"  What's  the  matter  with  George,  anyhow  3" 
he  asked  Walworth  one  evening.  They  were 
sitting  again  in  Floyd's  library,  and  a  light  haze 
of  tobacco-smoke  prompted  to  elegiac  revery. 
"  He  looks  old.  And  he  has  come  to  be  as  poky 
as  the  deuce.  He  seemed  last  night  as  if  he  was 
worried  half  to  death." 

"  I  guess  he  is,"  answered  Walworth.  "  He's 
anxious  about  his  wife,  for  one  thing." 

"  Well,  she  does  look  pretty  bad,  that's  a. fact. 
I  don't  believe  she  will  live  the  year  out.  The 
first  cold  weather  will  carry  her  off." 


276 


"  Don't  say  that !"  exclaimed  Mrs.  Floyd. 
"  She's  delicate,  and  she  has  got  to  take  care  of 
herself.  But  to  talk  about  dying — that's  anoth 
er  thing." 

"I'm  not  so  sure."  And  Wai  worth  shook  his 
head  gravely. 

"  But  there's  something  more  than  that,"  said 
Freddy.  "  It's  money.  Gad  !  how  they  are  fixed 
up  !  How  can  he  stand  it  ?" 

"  He  can't,"  answered  Wai  worth ;  "  he's  fall 
ing  behind.  And  there  is  that  house  of  his 
empty  yet.  I'd  take  it  off  his  hands  myself  if 
it  wasn't  for  being  left  in  the  same  fix  too. 
Wish  I  could  help  him ;  he  hasn't  said  anything, 
though." 

"  He  won't,  either,"  replied  Pratt.  «  He  ain't 
that  kind." 

"  Well,  I  don't  see  that  we  need  trouble  our 
selves  about  help,"  Ann  broke  in.  "  He  harmed 
me,  anyway,  a  great  deal  more  than  he  helped 
me — with  that  precious  brother-in-law  of  his." 

"  I  imagine  he  knows  all  about  the  brother- 
in-law,  too,  by  this  time,"  rejoined  Walworth. 
"  Haven't  you  got  almost  tired  of  twanging  that 
string  ?" 

He  wondered  if  Ogden's  brother-in-law  were 
really  as  trying  as  his  own  sister-in-law. 

Still  other  callers  favored  the  Ogdens.  Among 
them  was  one  that  had  not  called  at  the  other 
house — that  had  never  before,  indeed,  called  at 


277 


any  house  whatever.  About  the  first  of  August 
a  little  debutante  appeared  on  the  social  scene 
and  was  "  received  "  with  all  the  care  and  flatter 
ing  attention  that  the  new  apartment  had  at  its 
disposal.  She  was  a  pale  and  fragile  little  bud, 
like  many  of  the  exotics  with  which  her  mother 
was  fond  of  decorating  her  rooms;  she  had  the 
same  slender  fingers  that  set  these  flowers  around, 
and  the  same  large  blue  eyes  that  studied  their 
effect. 

A  nurse  came,  and  she  stayed  long  after  the 
time  when  a  mere  nurse-maid  should  have  taken 
her  place.  Curtains  were  pulled  down  and  kept 
so;  the  doctor's  carriage  (and  sometimes  more 
than  one)  stood  waiting  before  the  big  doorway 
of  the  "  Westmoreland  " ;  bottles  big  and  little 
accumulated  on  tables  and  shelves ;  and  cautious 
tiptoeing  became  the  habit  of  the  whole  house 
hold  ;  until,  at  the  end  of  a  month,  mother  and 
child  were  doing  as  well— and  only  as  well — as 
could  be  expected.  This  was  not  well  at  all. 
But  both  were  out  of  immediate  danger,  and 
presently  both  appeared  to  mend. 

The  nurse-maid  now  arrived,  and  the  carriage 
and  the  cap.  The  languid  young  mother  was 
capable  of  taking  but  a  tepid  interest  in  most 
things,  but  she  rallied  her  powers  to  enforce  the 
cap,  Cecilia  Ingles  was  her  model  here  as  in 
other  matters,  and  the  model  was  followed  close 
ly.  Not  every  girl  would  wear  a  cap,  but  at  last 


278 


a  capable  one  was  found  who  was  willing  to. 
The  lace  cover  of  the  perambulator  and  the 
white  frills  of  its  propeller  were  a  frequent  sight 
on  the  streets  for  a  little  time ;  then  the  neces 
sity  developed  for  the  transfer  of  mother,  child, 
and  nurse,  during  a  few  weeks,  to  the  conven 
ient  sanatorium  provided  by  nature  in  southern 
Wisconsin. 

The  little  party  was  back  again  in  town  at  the 
opening  of  the  fall  season.  Jessie  employed  her 
dwindling  powers  in  a  partial  resumption  of  the 
duties  which  she  felt  that  "  society "  demanded 
of  her,  and  the  child  taxed  the  energies  and  re 
sources  of  the  maid,  who  received  little  real  as 
sistance  from  its  mother.  There  were  small 
gusts  and  starts  of  maternal  affection  now  and 
then,  but  they  would  quickly  run  their  brief 
course  and  baby  would  be  carried  out  of  the 
room.  Ogden  wondered,  from  a  curiously  im 
personal  outside  standpoint,  whether  he  was  to 
attribute  this  to  his  wife's  waning  vitality  or  to 
an  inherent  incapacity  for  deep  and  genuine 
feeling. 

But  this  matter  soon  passed  beyond  the  con 
fines  of  discussion.  The  day  came  when  the 
nurse  was  dismissed,  the  carriage  was  put  away, 
and  Brower  went  with  the  stricken  father  to  se 
lect  a  lot  in  the  cemetery.  It  came  that  the  two 
stood  together  one  forenoon  before  a  wide  and 
polished  mahogany  counter,  and  bent  their  heads 


27' 


over  a  handsome  plat  that  was  neatly  lettered 
and  numbered,  and  was  shaded  in  pleasant  tints 
of  blue  and  green.  A  man  stood  on  the  other 
side  of  the  counter  and  tapped  the  drawing  here 
and  there  with  the  reversed  end  of  a  fat  pen 
holder. 

"  This  is  a  good  section,"  he  said ;  he  was 
pausing  over  a  green  oval  which  was  intersected 
by  four  or  five  fine  black  lines.  "  You  are  right 
on  a  leading  drive- way  " — carrying  the  pen-hold 
er  along  between  the  waving  of  two  other  and 
wider  lines  that  ran  parallel — "  and  just  over 
here  is  the  lake" — with  his  little  finger  on  a 
tangled  and  shapeless  patch  of  blue. 

"  That  small  lot  could  be  made  to  do,"  said 
Brower,  softly. 

"  This  is  the  most  fashionable  part  of  the 
whole  place,"  the  man  went  on,  with  an  indif 
ferent  loudness.  "  See  here."  He  took  down  a 
large  warped  photograph  from  its  place  on  a 
dusty  shelf  behind  him,  and  gave  it  a  dexterous 
wipe  with  his  elbow.  "  This  monument  here 
is  just  across  the  drive-way,  and  it  cost  twenty 
thousand  dollars.  Put  up  this  summer  by  Ar 
thur  J.  Ingles — I  guess  you've  heard  of  him" 

"  Good  God !"  groaned  Ogden.  "  Have  I  got 
to  compete  with  that  man  even  in  the  grave 
yard  ?" 

The  next  afternoon  a  sombre  little  procession 
took  its  w^ay  limits-ward  to  a  tract  outside,  which 


280 


was  tenderly  enclosed  by  great  stretches  of 
barbed  wire,  and  was  neighbored  by  the  noise 
and  glare  of  several  stone-cutting  yards.  This 
little  train  traversed  the  raw  and  ragged  edges 
of  the  town,  and  trailed  across  the  succeeding 
reach  of  open  prairie-land,  over  which  led  a  long, 
straight,  sandy  road,  dotted  here  and  there  with 
houses  of  refreshment  for  the  occupants  of 
mourning-coaches  and  for  their  drivers.  There 
was  the  raw  chill  in  the  air  which  the  north 
sometimes  sends  down  into  our  early  October 
days.  The  poor  mother  sobbed  and  coughed  and 
shivered  in  her  corner  of  the  carriage;  she  re 
turned  to  her  home  ill  and  exhausted,  and  en 
tered  it  never  to  leave  it  alive. 

It  costs  when  a  baby  comes,  it  costs  when  a 
/  baby  goes,  it  costs  when  a  wife  lies  sick  and  dy 
ing,  and  Ogden  now  confessed  himself  almost 
driven  to  the  wall. 

"  I  know,  George,"  his  wife  said,  "  that  every 
thing  has  been  a  great  expense;  but  I'm  sure 
papa  would  help  us  if  you  only  spoke  to  him." 

"  "What !"  he  cried,  harshly. 

She  started,  and  presently  was  all  a-tremble. 
Then  she  fell  back  weakly  and  coughed  long 
and  violently.  "  Oh,  George,  how  could  you  ?" 
she  gasped. 

"  Forgive  me,  my  poor  child,"  he  said,  and 
took  her  hand.  "  But  I  could  never  do  anything 
like  that — never." 


281 

The  next  day  he  took  the  McDowell  notes  and 
spent  what  time  he  could  spare  among  the  bro 
kers.  They  passed  commendingly  on  the  prompt 
payment  of  the  interest  as  shown  by  the  en 
dorsements  ;  but  McDowell  was  pretty  well 
known,  and  it  was  intimated  that  endorsements 
of  another  sort  would  be  needed  to  make  nego 
tiation  possible. 

Then  he  got  out  the  abstract  of  one  of  the 
McDowell  tracts — the  only  one  that  he  person 
ally  and  individually  had  any  right  to  use. 
"  You've  got  considerably  more  than  a  pocket 
ful  there,"  the  door-keeper  of  the  Clifton  De 
posit  Yaults  said  to  him  as  he  passed  out.  He 
left  the  abstract  with  a  firm  of  mortgage  bro 
kers  for  examination.  In  the  course  of  a  week 
they  advised  him  that  a  release  had  been  over 
looked — an  instrument  which  must  show  of  rec 
ord  before  a  loan  could  be  effected  on  the  prop 
erty. 

The  tract  had  been  put  through  a  good  many 
paces,  and  some  of  McDowell's  work  had  been 
too  hurried  to  be  careful.  The  man  to  give  the 
necessary  release  was  a  professional  tax-buyer. 
He  lived  on  the  mistakes  and  misfortunes  of 
other  people — their  sins  of  omission  and  commis-' 
sion;  and  such  an  act  from  such  a  man  would 
cost  something.  It  might  be  ten  dollars,  or  fifty, 
or  five  hundred. 

He  waited  in  this  harpj^'s  outer  office,  while 


282 


another  caller,  a  woman,  claimed  attention  in 
the  inner  one.  It  was  Ann  Wilde;  he  recog 
nized  her  and  she  recognized  him.  She  threw  a 
scowling  glance  upon  him,  and  her  harsh  and 
vindictive  tones  fell  on  his  ears  for  several  suc 
ceeding  minutes.  She  knew  his  necessities ; 
could  she  be  making  them  known  to  another  ? 

It  seemed  so  when  his  turn  came.  The  re 
lease  would  be  given  only  on  payment  of  a  sum 
that,  in  his  present  circumstances,  was  simply 
impossible. 

He  seemed  now  to  have  exhausted  all  expedi 
ents — all  legitimate  ones.  A  bitter  recollection 
of  that  Sunday  drive  in  the  country  came  over 
him ;  he  had  indeed  given  a  free  rein  to  his  wife, 
and  just  how  close  he  was  to  graze  against  ruin 
only  the  future  could  show.  He  spent  a  miser 
able,  sleepless  night,  and  at  daybreak  he  had  de 
cided  to  tax  the  bank  for  his  own  necessities — 
relying  upon  the  present  maturing  of  his  notes 
to  set  himself  right  within  a  month  or  two.  Do 
not  inquire  as  to  his  precise  method — there  are 
many  ways  to  take  :  the  actual  appropriation  of 
currency,  the  abstraction  of  securities,  the  over 
issue  of  certificates  of  stock,  and  so  on  and  on. 
He  chose  the  method  which  seemed  liable  to  the 
lightest  misconstruction  and  allowable  of  the 
promptest  reparation.  He  avoided  seeing  him 
self  in  the  aspect  of  a  criminal  by  pleading  his 
own  cruel  needs  and  by  believing  in  his  ability 


283 


to  make  a  prompt  and  complete  restitution. 
Perhaps  neither  of  these  two  reasons  could  have 
stood  alone,  but  they  leaned  together  and  held 
each  other  up — a  precarious  poise  that  was  not 
long  to  endure. 


XXII 

IT  endured,  in  fact,  scarcely  a  fortnight.  It 
lapsed  at  the  close  of  a  dull  October  day — a  day 
that  was  within  one  of  the  first  anniversary  of  his 
marriage.  Let  the  means  by  which  he  was  de 
tected  be  asked  no  more  than  the  means  through 
which  he  transgressed.  The  delicate  mechanism 
of  a  bank's  accounts  responds  sensitively  to  the 
slightest  and  most  ingenious  variation ;  and  it 
may  be,  too,  that  some  one  in  this  particular 
bank  was  watching  for  the  slip  and  was  waiting 
for  the  chance  to  expose  and  punish  it. 

The  smoky  dusk  of  the  short  afternoon  was 
falling  outside,  while  within,  under  the  illumi 
nation  made  by  a  single  electric  light,  a  mother, 
in  the  same  room  wrhere  one  of  Brainard's 
daughters  had  plead  for  the  other,  was  now 
pleading  with  him  for  her  son. 

No  taint  had  ever  fallen  before  on  any  of  her 
family  or  connections.  She  was  crushed  and 
dazed  at  the  thought  that  anything  like  this 
had  happened,  could  have  happened,  had  had 
the  slightest  need  of  happening.  And  she  was 
dumfounded  that  all  explanation  fell  upon  heed 
less  ears,  and  that  all  offers  of  restitution  en- 


285 


countered  such  stubborn,  brutish,  and  deter 
mined  opposition. 

"  We  have  lands,"  she  cried,  with  the  tears 
coursing  down  her  anxious  face.  "  We  can  make 
this  good,  twice  and  three  times  over.  What 
more  can  you  want  ?" 

But  Brainard  did  want  something  more.  He 
wanted  the  ruin  of  her  son. 

"  A  bank  can't  deal  in  real  estate,"  he  said 
doggedly. 

He  sent  a  malevolent  glance  across  the  table 
on  whose  far  edge  Ogden's  bowed  head  was 
resting.  Beside  Ogden  stood  Fairchild ;  there 
was  a  look  of  sympathetic  distress  upon  his 
kindly  face. 

"  It  is  true,"  he  said,  in  a  low  and  quiet  tone, 
"  that  it  is  not  allowable  for  us  to  make  a  loan 
upon  real  property ;  but  it  would  not  be  amiss 
for  us  to  take  it  in  payment  of  this — this — " 

"  Theft !  "  cried  Brainard  loudly.  Ogden 
winced  and  shuddered ;  his  mother  sank  into  a 
chair  with  a  low  moan. 

"Look  here,  Fairchild,"  the  old  man  went 
on,  holding  up  his  forefinger  with  an  offensively 
masterful  effect  of  caution,  "  it  will  pay  you  to 
go  pretty  slow  just  about  here.  This"  —  he 
wagged  his  head  contemptuously  towards  the 
bowed  head  of  the  culprit  —  "  was  your  man. 
You  took  his  letters  ;  you  put  him  in  here.  Just 
stop  and  think  of  that !" 


286 


Fairchild  bit  his  lip. 

"  And  the  other  man,  before  him,  was  yours. 
Don't  forget  that,  either."  His  face  showed  a 
cruel  and  malignant  grin. 

Fairchild  flushed,  and  lowered  his  eyes  to  the 
floor  in  silence.  Ogden  half  raised  his  head  to 
look  at  him;  what  could  these  words  mean? 
He  looked  at  his  mother,  too ;  she  was  lying 
back  with  her  face  in  her  hands. 

The  young  man's  own  face  was  mapped  with 
the  lines  of  a  worry  that  goads  one  on  to  des 
peration,  and  it  was  painted  with  the  blended 
hue  that  comes  from  shame  and  anxiety  and 
fear  and  the  exhausting  struggles  carried  on 
through  long  and  sleepless  nights.  It  was  hard 
to  face  these  other  faces ;  it  was  hard  to  face 
even  the  light  of  day,  thick  and  dulling  though 
it  might  be.  His  head  drooped  again  to  the 
friendly  dusk  of  the  table-top  before  him. 

"By  Heaven,"  Brainard  went  on,  "not  an 
other  man  comes  into  this  bank  except  under  a 
guarantee ;  and  he'll  pay  the  premium  for  it  if 
he  don't  stay  more  than  a  week.  You  might 
think,  in  a  small  bank  like  this,  that  some  kind 
of  eye  could  be  kept  on  things ;  but  it  seems 
not.  It's  pick  and  steal,  all  the  time ;  first  one, 
then  another.  No  sooner  is  young  Pratt  rooted 
out  than  this  fellow  comes  up.  One  steady 
string  of  flea-bites  —  I  can't  stand  it ;  I  won't 
stand  it.  Do  you  think  I  am  going  to  have 


287 


Shayne  and  Cutter  and  all  the  rest  of  'em  go 
around  and  tell  how  Brainard's  always  got 
somebody  else's  hand  in  his  pants  pocket  and 
never  finds  it  out  ?  Not  very  much.  I  do  find 
it  out  and  I'm  going  to  punish  it.  You  needn't 
ask  me  to  hold  off  —  it's  no  use.  There's  a 
law  for  this,  and  that  law  is  going  to  take  its 
course." 

His  white  hair  stood  up  in  a  stiff  shock  over 
his  forehead,  and  the  gray  gristle  sprouting  on 
his  lip  moved  up  and  down  forbiddingly  as  the 
lip  itself  worked  over  the  broken  row  of  his 
teeth.  The  red  veins  in  his  nose  showed  more 
redly  yet,  and  his  fists  were  clenched  at  the  ends 
of  his  down-hung  arms  with  the  straightened 
tension  of  an  inexorable  will. 

"  My  poor  boy !  My  poor  boy !"  his  mother 
cried.  She  came  over  to  him  and  bowed  her 
head  on  his. 

Fairchild  looked  at  Brainard  —  a  look  that 
called  for  all  his  self-control  and  fortitude. 
"  This  is  too  hard,"  he  said.  "  There  was  prov 
ocation  for  him,  and  there  are  means  to  make 
everything  good." 

"See  here,  Fairchild,"  cried  the  enraged  old 
man,  "  you  have  got  to  keep  out  of  this,  if  you 
want  to  stay  friends  with  me.  We've  pulled 
together  a  good  while,  but  we  shall  pull  apart 
after  five  seconds  more  of  this.  That  young 
man  there  has  fooled  along  with  us  a  little  too 


far.  He  has  had  his  fun,  and  now  he  shall  pay 
for  it.  He  shall ;  by  God,  I  say  he  shall !" 

His  voice  rose  to  a  harsh  and  strident  cry,  and 
his  great  fist  fell  with  a  ponderous  thud  on  the 
table  before  him. 

A  second  later  another  hand  was  heard  —  on 
the  other  side  of  the  door.  It  was  faint,  but  it 
was  audible.  It  had  been  preparing  for  five  long 
and  hesitating  minutes.  To  the  heart  that  guided 
this  hand  the  five  seemed  five-and-twenty. 

Fairchild  moved  swiftly  towards  the  door 
and  laid  his  hand  upon  the  knob  to  prevent 
any  intrusion. 

The  knock  was  repeated.  He  opened  the  door 
to  a  narrow  crack.  Then  he  opened  it  wider. 

Abbie  Brainard  stood  on  the  threshold. 

She  stepped  in  swiftly  and  softly.  She  shut 
the  door  behind  her  quickly  and  then  leaned 
her  back  against  its  shining  panels. 

Her  face  was  pale ;  her  bosom  was  heaving ; 
but  her  gray  eyes  gave  out  the  strong  and 
steady  light  of  courage  and  resolution. 

Ogden  saw  her.  He  locked  his  jaws,  and 
took  a  firm  hold  on  the  two  arms  of  his  chair, 
and  raised  himself  and  stood  erect  before  her. 
Had  not  she  herself,  on  this  very  spot,  once  done 
the  same  for  him?  However  it  might  be,  or 
might  have  been,  with  others,  here,  at  least,  was 
one  who  should  not  see  him  humbled. 

There  was  no  salutation  of  any  kind  on  either 


289 


side.  She  saw  him,  but  seemed  to  be  looking 
beyond  him  rather  than  at  him  ;  and  in  his  eyes 
she  stood  there  with  the  remote  inaccessibility 
of  some  distant  snow-peak. 

Her  father  turned  towards  her. 

"  Abbie  !  You  here  ?  What  do  you  want  ? 
What  do  you  mean  by  coming  in  like  this  ?  Go 
out  again !" 

She  looked  at  him  with  a  cool  and  quiet  in 
flexibility.  But  her  voice  was  low  and  trem 
bling  as  she  said, 

"  I  shall  stay." 

"  You  can't ;  you  mustn't.  You  don't  want  to 
mix  up  in  this  business — you  don't  understand." 

He  laid  one  hand  on  her  arm,  and  with  the 
other  he  reached  out  towards  the  door-knob. 

She  withdrew  her  arm  from  the  hold  of  his 
fingers. 

"  I  understand,"  she  said,  immovably. 

He  drew  back.  "  You  do  ?  Well,  stay  then, 
if  you  will,  and  understand  better.  Learn  what 
kind  of  a  man  he  really  is." 

He  thrust  out  his  arm  towards  Ogden,  with 
a  cruel  and  contemptuous  smile. 

"  He  came  here  with  letters,"  he  began.  "  We 
gave  him  a  chance.  Nobody  really  knew  what 
he  was—" 

Ogden  stood  there  straight  before  him.  He 
ground  his  teeth  together  to  keep  his  face  com 
posed  ;  behind  him  his  nails  dug  into  the  palms 
19 


290 


of  his  hands,  as  he  held  himself  back  from 
springing  forward  and  fastening  them  around 
the  throat  of  Abbie  Brainard's  father.  There 
was  a  ringing  in  his  ears,  and  through  it  there 
sounded  faintly  the  fine  tones  of  Fairchild,  speak 
ing  to  Mary  Brainard : 

"  Nobody  really  knows  who  he  is,  or  who  his 
people  are,  or  where  he  is  from  ...  a  town  full 
to  overflowing  with  single  young  men  .  .  .  from 
everywhere.  They  are  taken  on  faith.  Most  of 
them  are  all  right,  no  doubt ;  but  others — " 

He  was  now  one  of  the  "  others " ;  his 
"  people,"  whom  no  one  had  known,  were  to  be 
known  now,  after  years  of  probity,  as  the  rela 
tives  of  a— 

"  Nobody  really  knew  who  he  was,"  Brainard 
repeated ;  "  but  he  was  taken  right  in  and  given 
a  good  place.  Hasn't  he  ever  wondered  why  ? 
Is  it  so  easy  to  go  into  a  new  town,  and  get  a 
good  job  in  a  bank  the  very  first  thing  ?  Wasn't 
there  any  other  men  to  jump  at  the  chance  of  a 
position  half  as  good — ain't  the  city  full  of  'em? 
"Wasn't  there  any  of  'em  in  the  bank  itself  who 
was  waiting  for  the  place  themselves  —  and  had 
a  right  to  it,  too  ?  Why  was  there  a  vacant 
place  to  fill,  anyhow  ?  Because,  a  week  before, 
another  man  had  done  just  what  this  man  has 
done.  He  was  your  man,  Fairchild,  too.  And 
why  did  this  one  here  come  stepping  in  ahead 
of  all  the  old  ones  ?  You  fixed  it,  Fairchild ; 


291 


you  liked  his  looks  and  his  talk,  you  said.  An 
other  bad  guess  for  you." 

Fairchilcl  studied  the  carpet  with  abashed 
eyes,  as  were  he  himself  the  culprit. 

"  Yes,"  Brainard  continued,  "  he  was  put  in 
a  good  place  and  he  was  pushed  right  along. 
Hasn't  he  ever  guessed  why  ?  Does  a  new  man 
come  into  an  office  like  this,  and  get  as  far  along 
inside  of  a  year  as  he  has,  without  there  being 
any  reason  for  it  ?  I'll  tell  him  the  reason  for  it. 
I  did  it  because  my  girl  here — 

"  Father !"  cried  Abbie,  with  face  aflame. 
"No!  No!" 

"You  say  you  understand,"  he  said,  turning 
towards  her.  "  Now,  let  him  understand,  too.  I 
advanced  him  to  this  position,"  he  went  on 
shamelessly,  "because  my  girl  here  asked  me 
to." 

"  No,  father !  No  !"  the  poor  child  cried.  She 
threw  her  shamefaced  head  on  Mrs.  Ogden's 
bosom.  She  had  never  seen  her  before,  but 
under  such  circumstances  the  only  place  for  a 
woman's  face  was  on  another  woman's  breast. 

"Yes,  you  did,  too  —  ask  me,"  he  went  on, 
with  increased  hardihood.  "  Or  just  the  same  as 
asked  —  I  knew  what  you  meant,  well  enough. 
And  I  said  to  myself  I'd  do  it.  One  girl  went 
wrong,"  he  continued,  with  a  choking  in  his 
throat,  "and  I  wanted  to  do  what  I  could  to — 
I  wanted  Abbie  to  do  different ;  I  wasn't  going 


292 


to  have  her  carried  off  by  another  infernal  scoun 
drel." 

Ogden  flushed  and  paled  and  sank  down  into 
his  chair.  His  head  dropped  into  his  hands; 
there  was  no  possibility  of  his  holding  it  up  be 
fore  anything  like  this. 

"And  so  I  helped  him  on.  I  said,  'If  I  do 
the  right  thing  by  him,  he  will  do  the  right  thing 
by  —  her ;  he  will  act  like  a  man.'  I  did  do  the 
right  thing  by  him  —  and  what  then?  He  had 
been  hanging  around  all  the  spring  —  taking 
walks  and  sitting  out  in  front  and  borrowing 
books.  But  the  moment  I  put  him  on  his  legs 
what  did  he  do  ?" 

He  was  addressing  the  young  man's  mother 
now,  whose  tear-stained  face  showed  over  Ab- 
bie's  black  hat,  and  whose  poor  old  hand  was 
laid  tenderly  on  Abbie's  shoulder.  It  was  plain 
to  every  one  now  that  the  question  was  not  one 
of  money.  Ogden  saw  clearly  enough  at  last 
why  he  had  suffered  wreck  when  so  many  others 
had  ridden  the  waves.  Pratt  had  filched  and 
had  escaped.  McDowell  had  plundered  right 
and  left  and  had  never  been  brought  down. 
Brainard  himself  had  piled  up  a  scandalous  fort 
une  and  yet  had  contrived  to  evade  the  law. 
But  none  of  them  had  come  athwart  the  morti 
fied  rage  of  a  father — a  father  who  had  humbled 
his  inborn  savageness  and  pride  for  a  daughter's 
sake  and  had  humbled  himself  in  vain. 


Ogden  glanced  across  towards  Abbie.  She 
rested  on  his  mother's  shoulder  as  once,  almost, 
and  in  this  very  room,  she  had  rested  on  his. 
He  knew  why  she  had  come ;  he  recognized  her 
devotion  and  her  bravery.  She  had  overlooked 
his  pitiful  palterings ;  she  had  forgiven  the  final 
slight  to  which  they  had  led  ;  she  had  imperilled 
her  modesty  and  mortified  her  self-love  by  com 
ing  here  that  she  might  save  him  from  her  f ae 
ther's  vengeance. 

Her  father  looked  at  her  now  and  took  a 
softer  tone. 

"  She's  the  best  girl  there  ever  was  in  the. 
world,"  he  declared,  with  a  choking  voice  and  a 
moistened  glimmer  in  his  eyes;  "and  the  smart 
est — she  knows  how  to  do  everything ;  she's  the 
only  real  comfort  I've  ever  had.  She  would  be 
a  credit  to  any  man,  I  don't  care  who.  And 
what  does  he  pass  her  over  for  ?  For  another," 
he  went  on,  with  a  recrudescence  of  his  insane 
and  primitive  jealousy,  "  who  can't  care  for  her 
house,  who  couldn't  be  a  mother  to  his  child, 
who  has  ruined  him  by  her  extravagance — " 

"  Stop !"  cried  Ogden.  He  rose  and  approached 
Brainard.  There  was  a  threatening  glitter  in 
his  eyes,  and  convulsive  twitches  played  among 
his  fingers. 

"  Yes,  stop,  for  Heaven's  sake,"  said  Fairchild, 
laying  an  expostulatory  hand  on  the  old  man's 
arm.  "Stop,"  he  murmured  again;  "his  wife 
is  dying." 


294 


Abbie  rushed  between  Ogden  and  her  father. 
"George!  George!"  she  cried.  "Don't!  Be 
patient !" 

"  "What  if  his  wife  is  dying  ?"  called  out  the 
infuriated  old  wretch.  "  Is  that  any  reason  for 
lying  down  when  he  has  slighted  my  daughter 
and  robbed  me  ?" 

"  For  shame,  father !  For  shame !"  She  hid 
her  face  in  her  hands,  and  her  tears  gushed 
through  them. 

Ogden  paused,  stung  and  quivering.  His 
hands  dropped;  his  fingers  relaxed.  His  wife 
was  dying !  Nobody  had  told  him  that  before, 
and  he  had  never  dared  to  tell  it  to  himself. 
But  it  was  true,  and  he  knew  it. 

Abbie  rose  again  and  confronted  her  father. 
The  tears  were  still  in  her  eyes  and  a  wide  blush 
suffused  her  cheeks. 

"Father,  you  shall  not  punish  him.  He  may 
have  done  wrong,  but  there  was  reason  for  it. 
And  any  wrong  he  has  done  can  be  set  right." 

Ogden's  eyes  were  bedimmed,  but  through  the 
moisture  he  seemed  to  see  again  the  sight  that 
closed  the  evening  of  his  one-day  wedding  jour 
ney  towards  the  north ;  again  he  stood  on  the 
bridge,  and  the  sun  set  over  one  lake  while  the 
moon  rose  over  the  other.  Only  now,  with 
Abbie  Brainard's  blushes  before  his  body's  eye 
and  his  wife's  pale  face  before  his  mind's  eye,  a 
confusion  came  alike  over  his  thought  and  his 


295 


vision ;  it  was  now  the  sun  rising  on  him  at  the 
moment  that  the  pallid  moon  was  going  down. 
He  looked  at  her  and  she  looked  at  him,  and  in 
the  eyes  of  both  there  was  read  the  confession 
of  a  great  mistake.  Then  her  eyes  drooped  for 
shame  and  his  for  disloyalty,  and  neither  one  was 
able  to  look  into  the  other's  face  again. 

"  Do  you  defend  him  ?"  her  father  cried. 
"  Can  you  forgive  her  ?  I  can't  do  either.  ~No 
quarter ;  don't  ask  it,  Abbie.  He  has  chosen 
his  course — he  is  responsible  for  his  acts.  And 
he  shall  answer  for  them,  as  any  other  man  must 
who  crosses  me." 

He  flung  open  the  door  and  passed  out.  Fair- 
child  stood  anxiously  over  the  chair  in  which 
Abbie  lay  back  panting  for  breath.  Ogden 
pressed  her  hand  and  turned  towards  his  mother. 

"  Come,  let  us  go,"  he  said,  and  the  two 
passed  out  into  the  great  vestibule  of  the  Clif 
ton.  He  signalled  the  elevator. 

"  "Wait  for  me  here,  mother — five  minutes  ;" 
he  spoke  in  a  voice  which  she  hardly  recognized 
as  his.  "  Twelfth,"  she  heard  him  say  to  the 
boy  inside. 

"  Twelfth !"  she  gasped.  «  Twelfth  ?  It's  Eu 
gene  !" 

She  tried  to  stop  him;  her  fingers  merely 
caught  in  the  grille-work  that  shut  off  the  empty 
shaft. 

Why  do  we  go  mad?    Why  do  we  kill  our- 


296 


selves?  Why  is  there  more  insanity  and  more 
self-murder  to-day  than  ever  before  ?  It  is  be 
cause,  under  existing  conditions,  the  relief  that 
comes  from  action  is  so  largely  shut  off.  How 
has  humanity  contrived  to  endure  so  well  the 
countless  ills  of  countless  ages  ?  Because  society 
has  been,  in  general,  loose -knit,  so  that  each 
unit  in  it  has  had  room  for  some  individual 
play.  What  so  increases  and  intensifies  the  ago 
nies  of  to-day  ?  The  fact  that  society  has  a  closer 
and  denser  texture  than  ever  before;  its  fine 
spun  meshes  bind  us  and  strangle  us.  Indigna 
tion  ferments  without  vent ;  injury  awaits  with  a 
wearing  impatience  the  slow  and  formal  inflic 
tion  of  a  corporate  punishment;  self -conscious 
ness  paralyzes  the  quick  and  free  action^  that  is 
the  surest  and  sometimes  the  only  relief. 

McDowell  was  in  his  office  alone.  A  single 
light  was  burning  in  the  room,  and  nothing  re 
mained  but  the  drawing  down  of  a  desk-top  and 
the  quenching  of  the  light  before  locking  the 
door  from  the  outside  and  calling  the  day's  work 
over.  He  looked  up  as  Ogden  entered. 

"  Oh,  it's  you.  I  haven't  seen  you  for  some 
time  past."  He  used  the  dubious  intonation  that 
marks  a  half-smothered  enmity. 

"  Yes,  it's  I.  And  you  won't  see  me  for  some 
time  to  come.  You  see  me  this  once." 

He  stood  with  his  hand  on  the  back  of  a  chair. 
He  made  no  motion  to  seat  himself,  but  he  was 


297 


unmistakably  planted  there  to  remain.  McDow 
ell  therefore  resumed  his  own  accustomed  chair 
beside  his  desk. 

"  Well,  what  is  it  ?"  he  asked. 

He  scrutinized  Ogden  with  an  undisguised  cu 
riosity.  The  young  man's  voice  sounded  strange 
in  his  ears ;  his  face  had  an  expression  which 
made  it  almost  the  face  of  an  acquaintance  now 
ffrst  met. 

"  I  have  come  to  square  with  you,"  began  Og 
den,  slowly.  He  passed  an  unconscious  hand 
along  the  varnished  back  of  the  chair ;  it  was  a 
chair  in  yellow  oak,  whose  frame  was  light  but 
strong,  and  whose  seat  was  of  cane. 

"  We  are  square,"  said  McDowell,  curtly. 
"  You  have  your  deeds  for  that  ground — all  put 
into  the  settlement  at  a  fair  value.  I  have  paid 
your  interest  as  it  came  due,  and  shall  go  on  do 
ing  so.  The  principal  the  same.  I'm  all  right ; 
what  is  it  you  want  ?  Try  the  courts,  if  you 
think  you  can  reach  me?} 

"  I  shall  reach  you." 

"  I  wonder  how  2" 

Ogden  lifted  his  hand  from  the  chair  to  his 
forehead,  across  which  he  passed  it  once  or 
twice.  McDowell  gave  him  an  amused  smile. 

"  You  have  robbed  me,"  Ogden  said ;  "  you 
have  disgraced  me  ;  you  have  brought  me  to  the 
edge  of  ruin.  You  took  advantage  of  my  trust, 
my  inexperience,  my  strangeness  to  the  city.  You 


298 


have  stripped  us  all,  and  you  have  used  my  sister 
for  a  shield.  You  knew  we  would  stand  every 
thing  for  her,  and  we  have  stood  everything. 
You  have  acted  like  a  sneak  and  a  coward." 

McDowell's  eyes  dropped  to  his  desk.  But  no 
flush  mounted  to  his  face ;  that  would  have  been 
a  physical  and  a  moral  impossibility.  He  looked 
up  again  after  a  moment. 

"  You  will  reach  me  ?     I  wonder  how  ?" 

Ogden,  for  the  first  time  in  his  life,  passed 
completely  out  of  himself.  There  fell  away  from 
him  all  the  fetters  that  shackle  the  super-civilized 
man  who  is  habitually  conscious  of  his  civiliza 
tion. 

«  Like  this." 

He  seized  the  chair,  raised  it  over  McDowell's , 
head,  and  went  out,  leaving  the  man  crushed  and 
bleeding  on  the  floor. 


XXIII 

BKAINAKD,  after  leaving  the  office  of  the  bank, 
had  also  taken  the  elevator,  and  before  Ogden 
had  reached  McDowell's  floor  his  chief  stood  at 
the  door  of  Freeze  &  Freeze ;  the  firm  did  some 
legal  business  for  him  now  and  then,  under  his 
own  general  designation  of  "odd  jobs."  But 
their  door  was  locked,  as  it  usually  was  at  that 
hour ;  and  the  old  man  descended  again,  took  the 
street-car,  and  Avent  home  to  tea. 

"  I've  got  him,  all  the  same,"  he  muttered  to 
himself.  "  He  can  have  a  little  leeway  if  he 
wants,  but  it  won't  carry  him  very  far  off — as 
things  are  now." 

He  stamped  and  fumed  through  the  parlor 
floor  for  the  quarter  of  an  hour  during  which  he 
attended  the  preparation  of  tea  in  the  basement 
dining-room.  He  sat  down  with  Burt  and  Cor 
nelia  and  his  younger  daughter ;  Abbie  had  shut 
herself  up  in  her  room,  and  had  sent  down  word 
that  she  was  too  ill  to  appear. 

The  table  was  set  with  the  plated  ware  of 
twenty  years  ago,  hideous  in  varied  quirks  and 
chasings.  Just  within  the  door  of  the  room 
stood  a  baby's  high-chair  ;  and  Brainard,  in  pass- 


300 


ing  to  his  place,  contrived  to  put  a  vicious  foot 
heavily  on  one  of  its  sprawling  wicker  legs. 

He  went  through  the  meal  with  a  great  grind 
ing  of  molars  and  a  loud  smacking  of  lips.  He 
said  nothing ;  he  handled  his  knife  and  fork  and 
his  goblet  with  a  heavy-handed  clatter,  while  his 
eyes  stared  fixedly  at  the  table-cloth.  The  oth 
ers  watched  him  in  silence  ;  his  teeth  were  grind 
ing  something  other  than  food,  and  the  smack 
ing  of  his  lips  indicated  a  relish  beyond  that  for 
any  mere  eating  and  drinking. 

After  his  second  cup  of  tea  he  arose  and 
pushed  back  his  chair,  and  planted  his  feet  with 
a  ponderous  stamp  on  the  space  over  which  the 
chair  had  stood. 

"  Burt,"  he  said,  as  he  moved  towards  the 
door,  "  you  can  step  down  the  street  when  you 
get  through,  and  tell  Albert  Freeze  to  come  up 
here.  I  shall  be  in  my  room." 

He  commanded  the  attendance  of  his  attor 
neys  as  lightly  as  he  commanded  that  of  his 
clerks.  The  Freezes  happened  to  be  youngish 
men,  but  it  would  have  been  the  same  with 
older  ones. 

He  withdrew  to  his  den.  He  rearranged  the 
coke-balls  that  he  had  had  spread  on  the  top  of 
(his  grate  fire,  and  then  he.  began  to  rummage 
among  the  disordered  papers  on  his  desk. 

A  book  was  lying  among  them — a  thin  vol 
ume,  with  the  place  marked  by  a  paper-cutter. 


301 


"  I  wish  Abbie  wouldn't  leave  her  things 
around  everywhere,"  he  said,  grumblingly. 

He  tossed  the  book  across  to  a  table.  The 
paper-cutter  fell  out  of  it,  but  landed  by  its  side, 
where  it  balanced  on  one  corner  of  the  table- 
top.  It  was  a  cumbrous  implement,  somewhat 
after  the  fashion  of  a  dagger,  and  it  was  smeared 
over  with  something  that  produced  the  effect  of 
green  bronze. 

He  went  to  the  window  and  looked  out  before 
pulling  down  its  shade ;  the  window  opened,  af 
ter  the  manner  of  a  door,  on  the  side  porch.  A 
misty  rain  was  falling — slight,  but  deadly  chill, 
and  through  it  there  appeared  the  discolored 
flank  of  the  stable,  draped  with  the  autumnal 
stringiness  of  its  wild  cucumber  vines. 

The  door  of  the  room  opened  with  a  swift  and 
sudden  quiet,  and  a  young  man  stepped  in.  His 
shoulders  were  covered  with  a  thousand  shim 
mering  rain-globules,  and  his  breath  gave  out  a 
strong  reek  of  brandy.  It  was  Marcus. 

"  I  want  to  see  Mr.  Brainard,"  he  had  said,  at 
the  outer  door,  to  the  strange  servant-girl,  and  he 
had  pushed  straight  by  her  without  further  word. 

He  stood  there  pale  and  tremulous;  his  eyes 
glittered  like  two  knife-points. 

"  I'm  out  again,"  he  said.  "  I've  got  another 
chance,  and  I  don't  mean  to  lose  this  one." 

His  father  turned  on  him  Avith  a  fierce  frown 
— a  frown  full  of  malevolent  intention. 


302 


"  It's  you,  is  it  ?"  He  was  silent  for  a  mo 
ment.  "  Well,  you  can  stay.  I've  been  think 
ing  about  you,  lately.  I  can  'tend  to  two  as  well 
as  one." 

"  You've  been  thinking  about  me  lately,  have 
you  ?"  Marcus  repeated.  He  spoke  with  a  hardi 
hood  that  came  from  draughts  of  brandy  more 
than  once  indulged  in.  "You  had  better  have 
thought  of  me  before." 

"  I'm  thinking  to  just  as  much  purpose,"  his 
father  declared  grimly.  "I  haven't  been  alto 
gether  in  the  dark,"  he  went  on, "  about  your  go 
ings  and  your  doings.  I  know  what  you've  been 
living  on,  and  how  you  got  it,  and  who  put  you 
up  to  it  all.  I  know  how  you  have  been  figuring 
on  my  dying  and  preying  on  me  before  my  dy 
ing  ;  but  I'm  alive  yet,  and  the  next  time  you  see 
that  singing  Canadian  scoundrel  you  can  tell  him 
so.  And  I  know  all  about  your  latest  tactics, 
too.  Do  you  see  that  ?" 

A  pass-book  was  lying  on  his  desk,  and  be 
tween  its  covers  there  was  a  packet  of  checks, 
bound  by  a  rubber  strap.  He  drew  out  the  top 
check  and  extended  it  towards  his  son ;  he  used 
his  clumsy  thumb  and  forefinger  to  keep  a  strong 
hold  on  one  end  of  the  paper— the  end  that  bore 
the  signature. 

"You've  seen  it  before,  too,  unless  I'm  mis 
taken,"  he  went  on,  with  a  glance  in  which  in 
dignation  was  overlaid  by  a  cruel  sense  of  power 


303 


and  a  cruel  determination  to  use  it.  "You 
didn't  expect  it  to  get  around  to  me  quite  so 
quick,  did  you?" 

"I  see  it,  yes,"  said  the  young  man.  "And 
I've  seen  it  before.  What  of  it  ?"  He  spoke 
like  one  who  had  nerved  himself  to  this — and  to 
more. 

"  What  of  it  ?"  cried  his  father,  in  a  sudden  fit 
of  rage.  "  There's  this  of  it !  Do  you  think 
I'm  going  to  stand  being  stripped  by  a  thieving 
scamp  like  you  ?  Do  you  think  I'm  going  to  be 
bled  drop  by  drop  by  a  couple  of  infernal  scoun 
drels?  Oh,  that  whining  about  your  drawing, 
and  your  not  being  allowed  to  go  on  with  it ! 
You  can  handle  a  pen  all  right  enough !  You 
can  draw  checks  for  me,  and  you  can  draw  your 
self  to  Joliet !  That's  the  best  place,  all  around, 
for  both  of  us." 

"  I  shouldn't  mind  meeting  you  there,"  said 
Marcus,  with  a  contemptuous  sneer.  "  There 
would  be  a  c  couple,'  sure  enough — the  only  one 
/know  anything  about." 

"  Where  is  that  wretch  ?"  cried  Brainard,  seiz 
ing  the  youth  by  the  arm.  "  You  know ;  you  do, 
too — you  see  him  every  day !  Tell  me  where  I 
can  find  him!  He  must  be  followed  up.  Let 
me  get  him,  too,  and  put  him  where  he  be 
longs  !" 

"  Keep  off !"  called  his  son ;  "  keep  off,  you 
fool !  I  haven't  seen  him  for  a  year,  and  I  don't 


304 


want  to  see  him  for  another.  It's  you  I  want  to 
see  ;  you  and  Burt — brother  Burt." 

His  eyes  glittered  with  a  sharpened  anger,  and 
his  dilated  nostrils  quivered  with  the  indignation 
that  the  thought  of  his  elder  brother  always 
aroused. 

"  I  want  to  see  the  vice-president  of  the  Un 
derground  National.  I  want  to  see  the  bride 
groom  who  got  half  a  million  on  his  wedding- 
day.  And  I  want  him  to  see  me.  I  want  him 
to  have  a  look  at  the  poor  devil  who  has  been 
knocking  around  from  pillar  to  post  for  the  last 
two  years,  who  has  hidden  in  dives,  and  who 
has  been  dragged  through  the  slums,  and  who 
has  been  driven  from  the  variety  stage,  and  has 
served  his  time  more  than  once.  Let  him  feel 
the  difference  ;  let  me  help  him  to  feel  it !" 

"  Your  own  blame !"  cried  his  father.  "  You 
had  the  same  chances  and  threw  them  all  away. 
And  you'll  serve  another  term  now — a  longer 
one." 

"  I  guess  not,"  said  Marcus.  He  looked  about 
the  room  with  a  sharp  and  wary  eye.  It  might 
have  been  thought  that  he  sought  at  once  both 
means  of  offence  and  means  of  escape. 

There  was  a  rap  on  the  door;  Burt's  voice  was 
heard  outside. 

"  Here's  Mr.  Freeze,  father.  I  suppose  he  can 
come  right  in." 

Marcus  reared  his  head  suddenly. 


305 

"  It's  Burt !"  he  trumpeted.  "  He's  here!  he's 
here!"  He  sprang  towards  the  threshold  and 
clamped  his  long  fingers  about  his  brother's 
throat.  Burt's  head  struck  with  force  against 
the  wide  jamb ;  he  half  fell,  and  his  legs  and 
arms  writhed  in  company  with  his  brother's. 

"  Get  them  apart,  Freeze !  Get  them  apart !" 
cried  Brainard,  with  a  loud  roar.  "  Am  I  going 
to  see  Burt  strangled  before  my  very  eyes  ?" 

Marcus  released  his  grip  and  staggered  back 
into  the  room.  He  reared  himself  pantingly 
against  the  table.  His  face  was  deadly  pale,  and 
the  perspiration  was  starting  out  in  beads  be 
neath  the  dark,  disordered  locks  that  lay  on  his 
forehead.  The  screaming  of  women's  voices  was 
heard  in  the  corridor  outside,  and  the  light  hast 
ening  of  women's  feet. 

u  Three  to  one  !"  panted  Marcus.  "  It's  a  plot ! 
it's  a  trap  !  I  know  you,  Freeze.  I  see  through 
all  of  you.  But  three  ain't  enough.  You  can't 
doit;  no!" 

Abbie  Brainard  came  rushing  through  the 
hall.  She  reached  the  threshold  and  paused 
there  to  see  her  brother  catch  up  her  paper- 
cutter  from  the  table,  plunge  it  into  her  fa 
ther's  neck,  and  break  through  the  window, 
and  to  hear  his  nimble  feet  clatter  escape  down 
the  stairs  of  the  side  porch. 

Brainard  fell  heavily  against  the  marble  slabs 
of  the  fire-place.  Blood  soaked  his  high,  old- 

20 


306 


fashioned  collar  and  trickled  down  the  plaits  of 
his  shirt-front.  He  lay  there  stunned  and  bleed 
ing,  and  lifeless — as  it  seemed. 

His  huge  bulk  was  gotten  laboriously  to  bed — 
half  dragged,  half  lifted.  He  lay  there  for  a 
fortnight,  between  life  and  death. 

The  doctor  came,  and  with  the  chill  gray  of 
the  first  dawn  came  the  nurse.  It  was  to  be  a 
hand-to-hand  struggle,  and  all  the  forces  were 
engaged  at  once.  The  nurse  spent  the  first  half- 
hour  of  uncertain  daylight  in  bringing  order  out 
of  the  chaos  that  had  established  its  instant  sway 
in  the  old  man's  room  on  the  evening  before. 
She  raised  or  lowered  the  shades,  adjusted  the 
transom,  quieted  the  fire,  and  arranged  her  bot 
tles  and  bandages.  She  wore  the  dull  uniform 
of  a  public  institution  ;  and  she  was  accustomed 
to  carry  this  uniform  at  a  moment's  notice  into 
strange  places  and  among  strange  people.  She 
accepted  her  assignment  blindly,  and  took  up  its 
details  afterwards. 

She  seemed  of  a  rather  rugged,  stolid  build, 
but  her  eyes  were  eloquent  with  a  haunting  sor 
row.  It  was  as  if  time  had  redraped  her  figure 
with  the  flesh  that  sorrow  and  suffering  had 
once  stripped  from  it,  but  had  been  powerless  to 
reclothe  her  spirit  in  its  pristine  hope  and  cheer 
fulness. 

She  stood  at  the  window,  endeavoring  to  get 
her  bearings  in  the  early  light  of  the  dim  morn- 


307 


ing.  The  lilacs  and  syringas  in  the  yard  showed 
the  crinkled  brownness  of  latest  autumn.  A  boy 
was  crossing  and  recrossing  the  street  to  put  out 
its  lamps  ;  and  in  the  second-story  window  of 
the  stable  the  flickering  of  a  single  gas-jet  was 
helping  the  coachman  and  hostler  to  make  up 
his  own  bed. 

Behind  her  she  heard  the  heavy  grunting 
breath  of  the  sick  man.  Presently  another  sound 
mingled  with  it — a  creeping  and  rustling  sound 
that  made  its  little  track  along  the  hall  and 
across  the  threshold  of  the  half-open  door.  She 
turned  ;  a  baby  was  on  the  floor  beside  her — a 
beautiful  boy  with  dusky,  liquid  eyes,  and  the 
beginnings  of  a  poll  of  dark  and  curly  hair.  An 
inquiring  pain  plucked  at  her  heart  and  set  its 
signal  in  her  eyes ;  she  saw  a  resemblance  that 
it  was  impossible  to  overlook.  She  cast  a  hungry 
and  timorous  glance  about  her,  and  presently, 
with  a  great  yearning  and  a  steadying  resolve, 
Jane  Doane  was  kissing  Russell  Yibert's  child. 

For  this  privilege  she  wras  indebted,  in  a  sense, 
to  Erastus  Brainard.  She  had  never  been  in 
debted  to  him  for  anything  else. 

The  old  man  lay  in  a  kind  of  stupor ;  his  head 
had  been  seriously  injured  by  his  fall,  and  blood- 
poisoning  of  the  most  virulent  type  pointed  to 
his  inevitable  end.  He  had  occasional  moments 
of  recurring  consciousness,  and  at  such  times  he 
attempted,  with  the  help  of  Abbie  and  of  Freeze, 


308 


to  bring  his  affairs  into  order,  and  to  dispose  of 
his  belongings  by  will. 

The  Ogden  affair,  meanwhile,  stood  still.  No 
formal  steps  had  been  taken,  and  the  young  man 
had  Fairchild's  assurance  that  an  accommoda 
tion  was  sure  to  be  brought  about. 

The  situation  became  known  to  the  Bradleys 
— in  its  general  outlines,  at  least.  They  caught 
at  the  end  and  ignored  the  means,  as  would 
have  been  done  by  anybody  else  in  their  posi 
tion.  They  considered  that  their  friendliness 
towards  Ogden  had  been  misplaced  and  that 
their  confidence  had  been  betrayed.  They  pre 
served  appearances  with  him  through  their 
daughter's  final  illness ;  and  by  a  great  effort 
they  even  produced  an  effect  of  a  common  suf 
fering  and  a  common  sympathy  at  the  funeral. 
But  after  that  they  never  saw  him  again.  The 
difficulty  with  the  bank  did  not  become  public, 
but  they  considered  themselves,  all  the  same,  no 
less  disgraced  than  deceived. 

The  desperate  illness  of  Brainard  dragged  it 
self  along,  meanwhile,  and  the  house  was  satu 
rated  with  gloom.  Abbie  assisted  actively  in  the 
nursing;  she  watched  in  alternation  with  the 
first  nurse  and  with  the  succeeding  one.  Corne 
lia  was  given  an  opportunity  to  put  her  hand  to 
the  household  helm.  As  she  said  to  herself,  she 
was  soon  to  manage  a  house  of  her  own,  and  she 
might  as  well  be  brushing  up  her  knowledge. 


309 


"  And  she  has  got  to  go  with  me,"  Cornelia 
said  to  herself  for  the  twentieth  time;  "  she  can't 
live  here  after — this." 

Cornelia  had  fought  out  many  a  fight  during 
her  year  in  this  grisly  old  house ;  but  she  saw 
now  that  her  intended  campaign  on  behalf  of 
Marcus  was  an  impossibility,  and  that  all  the 
forces  might  as  well  be  withdrawn  from  the  field. 

Nobody  had  seen  the  youth  since  that  fatal 
night ;  nobody,  that  is,  who  had  cared  to  make 
the  fact  known.  Neither  did  anybody  know 
where  he  was  keeping  himself,  save  the  sister 
on  whose  night-watches  he  had  once  or  twice 
stolen  by  way  of  the  window  through  which 
he  had  made  his  escape  from  his  brother  and 
Freeze. 

He  came  again — for  a  third  and  last  time.  It 
was  one  o'clock  in  the  morning  when  she  heard 
his  light  touch  on  the  window.  She  hastened  to 
him  with  her  mouth  set  for  a  terrified  whisper. 

"  Yes,  I  know  it's  dangerous,  Abbie ;  I  know 
I  promised  not  to  come  again.  But  I  can't  help 
it — I've  got  to  hear.  How  is— how  are  things 
going  on  to-night?  Is  there  any  improvement 
over  yesterday?"  He  locked  his  fingers  in  a 
convulsive  strain.  "  I  thought  they  had  laid  a 
trap  for  me,"  he  said  chokingly.  "  Just  tell  me 
yourself  how  it  is,  and  after  this  you  can  send 
me  word,  as  you  have  before.  I  won't  come 
again,  I  promise  you." 


310 


She  threw  herself  on  his  breast  and  burst  into 
an  agony  of  tears.  "  Ho,  you  never  will,"  she 
sobbed;  "he  is  dying.  There  is  no  hope;  he 
won't  live  till  morning." 

The  young  man  trembled  like  an  aspen ;  tears 
rolled  out  of  his  dark  and  hollow  eyes.  lie 
tried  to  speak,  but  no  word  came.  Then  he 
clasped  his  sister  in  his  arms  and  withdrew  as 
he  had  entered. 

The  night,  laden  with  anxiety  and  fear, 
dragged  out  its  weary  length.  In  the  early 
morning  the  house  resounded  with  a  great  cry. 
The  dying  man,  in  a  brief  moment  of  conscious 
ness,  half  raised  himself  and  heard  the  sound 
and  the  tidings  thus  conveyed.  The  word  was 
passed  from  man-servant  to  maid-servant,  and 
came  to  their  master  through  the  voice  of  a 
Swedish  girl  whose  mind  was  capable  of  deal 
ing  with  emotions  only  in  the  most  primitive 
way,  and  whose  imperfect  command  of  English 
made  her  communication  come  with  a  horrible 
and  harrowing  directness.  One  second  before 
Erastus  Brainard  fell  back  dead  he  knew  that 
his  son  had  hanged  himself;  the  last  picture 
that  rose  before  his  fleeting  vision  was  that  of 
his  boy  pendulous  from  the  rafters  of  the  sta 
ble,  his  slight  body  swinging  to  and  fro  and  his 
tongue  protruding  uglily  from  the  purple-black 
of  his  face. 


"'HOW'S   TTTTS,   JO?'   ASKED   OGDEN." 


XXIY 

THE  months  passed  by,  and  autumn  came 
around  once  more. 

Ogden's  first  year  as  a  widower  was  lived 
with  his  mother ;  he  used  the  same  time  to  es 
tablish  himself  in  the  real-estate  business,  whose 
ins  and  outs  he  had  now  mastered  in  the  bitter 
school  of  experience.  He  had  left  the  Clifton 
altogether,  and  had  established  himself  in  anoth 
er  street  and  a  different  neighborhood.  Every 
stone  of  the  great  pile  seemed  to  have  raised  its 
tongue  against  him,  and  to  have  driven  him  out 
with  the  loud  and  insulting  hubbub  of  its  angry 
clamor.  He  had  no  wish  ever  to  see  again  the 
room  in  which  he  had  first  met  his  wife,  the 
room  in  which  he  had  wrestled  with  his  brother- 
in-law,  the  room  in  which  disgrace  had  forced 
him  to  bow  his  head.  Bradley  lay  in  wait  for 
him  in  the  court,  Jane  Doane  dogged  him  through 
the  long  corridors,  Marcus  Brainard  rose  up  as 
a  pallid  spectre  within  the  entrance-way.  He 
left  the  building  for  once  and  for  all.  The  pla 
cards  that  he  placed  on  vacant  tenements  and 
the  signs  that  he  caused  to  be  reared  on  open 
corners  in  the  suburbs  directed  inquirers  to  a 


312 


street  and  number  quite  different  from  any  near 
his  old  neighborhood. 

Within  this  year  Cornelia  Tillinghast  Brain- 
ard  had  moved  into  her  new  house  and  had 
moved  out  again.  For  three  poor  months  she 
occupied  her  French  Eenaissance  chateau  on  the 
Lake  Shore  Drive,  and  then  she  gave  it  up  for 
ever.  In  vain  her  anxious  plannings  of  chambers 
and  stairways,  her  long  waitings  for  the  slow 
finishing  of  the  carved  oaks  and  walnuts  of  her 
vast  interiors ;  in  vain  (for  the  present,  at  least) 
her  lofty  aims  in  the  direction  of  social  distinc 
tion.  For  Burt  with  his  father  was  one  man, 
and  Burt  without  his  father  was  another.  He 
had  relied  upon  the  elder's  advice  more  than  he 
had  realized,  and  he  had  felt  the  steadying  and 
restraining  power  of  his  father's  hand  to  a  great 
er  degree  than  he  would  have  been  willing  to 
acknowledge.  "When  he  came  to  act  for  himself 
and  by  himself  the  difference  soon  became  ap 
parent.  He  operated  in  a  variety  of  directions ; 
he  was  confident  and  daring  and  ambitious,  and 
one  day  he  risked  all  and  lost  all. 

His  failure  swept  away  everything  of  his  and 
nearly  everything  of  his  sister's.  Abbie  had 
come  into  the  new  house  along  with  Burt  and 
Cornelia  —  no  great  urging  had  now  been  re 
quired  to  induce  her  to  abandon  the  house  on 
the  West  Side.  She  led  the  same  retired  and 
quiet  life  in  the  one  quarter  that  she  had  led  in 


313 


the  other,  save  that  she  never  felt  otherwise 
than  utterly  strange  and  forlorn.  And  as  she 
had  placed  herself  in  her  brother's  house,  so  she 
put  a  great  part  of  her  share  in  her  father's  es 
tate  into  her  brother's  hands  when  ruin  came 
and  every  available  resource  was  required.  She 
had  never  used  much  money  ;  she  may  not  have 
realized  the  gravity  of  her  sacrifice.  Perhaps, 
too,  she  had  hoped  to  rest  her  disappointed  soul 
on  something  that  money  could  not  buy. 

To  Cornelia  the  failure  came  as  a  sudden  and 
awful  blow.  Considering  the  brief  time  at  her 
disposal,  she  had  made  a  distinct  impression  on 
society.  A  great  many  people  of  consequence 
came  to  her  house  and  invited  her  to  theirs. 
They  laughed  at  her  freedoms  and  familiarities  ; 
they  enjoyed  her  picturesque  and  untrammelled 
phraseology.  Some  of  the  more  insatiable  in 
vited  her  twice.  She  encountered  but  one  de 
cided  check ;  this  was  from  Mrs.  Floyd. 

The  ship  of  the  Floyd  household,  now  navi 
gating  regardless  of  its  customary  dependence 
on  the  distant  admiral  of  the  whole  Floyd  fleet, 
was  tossing  in  shallow  yet  stormy  waters ;  there 
were  not  lacking  indications  that  it  was  occa 
sionally  grazing  bottom,  and  there  was  a  notion 
abroad  that  it  might  presently  beach  or  founder. 
Mrs.  Floyd  therefore  manned  the  helm  with 
more  than  her  customary  caution.  For  one 
thing,  she  set  the  ship's  chronometer  by  local 


314 


time.  That  is  to  say,  her  own  watch,  which 
had  now  been  giving  the  time  of  Boston  for 
the  last  three  years  (and  she  had  become  very 
expert  in  the  deducting  of  the  hour  and  some 
minutes  of  difference)  came  to  be  set  by  the 
hour  of  Chicago.  For  another  thing,  she  must 
think  twice  before  speaking  every  strange  craft 
— such  a  one,  for  example,  as  that  propelled  by 
the  Brainards.  She  did  think  twice,  and  con 
cluded  to  remain  silent. 

"  Huh  !"  said  Cornelia ;  "all  because  I  worked 
in  her  husband's  office,  and  she  met  me  there ! 
Thank  goodness,  I  wasn't  allowed  to  have  my 
wish  and  work  for  Ingles,  too  !  I'll  fetch  things 
around,  though — you  see  if  I  don't ;  and  I'll  capt 
ure  Cecilia  Ingles  yet !" 

Abbie,  along  with  many  other  persons  and 
things,  became  a  mere  piece  of  driftwood  in  the 
general  wreck  of  her  brother's  fortunes.  She 
swirled  and  eddied  about  for  some  time  through 
a  succession  of  boarding-houses,  and  after  a 
while  she  found  refuge  in  the  latest  home  that 
her  sister  had  made.  She  found  her  new 
brother-in-law  a  good-humored  and  well-dis 
posed  fellow.  Briggs  had  established  his  family 
in  the  old  neighborhood  on  the  West  Side,  and 
readily  admitted  Abbie;  he  made  no  more  ob 
jection  to  his  sister-in-law  than  he  had  made  to 
his  sister-in-law's  nephew. 

Ogden  saw  nothing  of  them,  heard   nothing 


315 


of  them.  He  merely  went  around  in  a  quiet 
way  among  a  few  old  friends,  and  he  dropped 
in  at  frequent  intervals  on  the  faithful  Brower. 
Brower  was  sometimes  at  home  and  sometimes 
away;  the  fire-fiend  still  kept  him  on  the  move. 
One  late  September  evening,  after  an  interval 
of  a  month  or  more,Ogden  repaired  again  to  the 
house  which  had  once  been  their  common  home, 
and  found  Brower  just  back  from  Minnesota. 

He  was  seated  on  his  trunk,  the  rigors  of 
whose  cover  he  had  softened  by  the  doubled 
folds  of  a  striped  travelling  -  wrap.  He  had  his 
brier-wood  pipe  in  his  mouth  and  a  book  in  his 
hand.  It  was  a  paper- bound  volume;  the  back 
cover  was  missing,  and  there  was  exposed  to 
view  the  fine,  close  tabulation  of  the  books  com 
posing  a  well-known  "  library." 

"  Well,  my  dear  fellow,"  cried  Brower,  rising 
and  grasping  his  hand,  "how  are  you?  Say,  I 
believe  you're  looking  better.  Here;  put  your 
self  in  the  light  where  I  can  have  more  of  a 
chance  at  you." 

George  stood  immovable,  and  Brower  jerked 
out  the  elbowed  gas-jet,  so  as  to  make  the  light 
fall  upon  his  visitor's  face.  It  fell  on  his  visitor's 
head,  too,  and  the  whole  brown  head  was  sprin 
kled  with  silver. 

Ogden  put  his  two  palms  on  his  temples  and 
spread  out  his  hands  until  the  finger-tips  met 
over  the  part  in  his  hair. 


316 


"  There  are  more,"  he  said,  with  a  smile  of 
quiet  sadness  ;  "don't  count  them  again." 

"  I  won't,"  said  Brower.  He  drew  away  his 
eyes,  but  threw  his  arm  over  the  other's  shoul 
der. 

"  I've  had  quite  a  trip,  this  time,"  he  went  on, 
in  the  tone  which  we  employ  when  contriving  a 
light  diversion.  "  Been  away  out  into  Dakota — 
Bismarck,  Mandan,  Yankton,  Sioux  Falls.  I  was 
at  the  Falls  one  Sunday." 

"  Is  that  any  great  place  to  spend  Sunday  ?" 

"  Lots  of  folks  go  there  to  spend  a  few  Sun 
days  —  twelve  or  fourteen  Sundays,  and  the 
week-days  between.  On  the  evening  of  my  Sun 
day  I  went  to  church." 

"  I've  known  you  to  go  to  church  on  Sunday 
evenings  before.  Service  any  different  from  any 
other?" 

"  It  was  a  song  service.  Don't  you  suppose 
the  poor  creatures  waiting  along  out  there  in 
Sioux  Falls  have  got  to  have  their  little  consola 
tions  ?  Ain't  music  the  great  consoler  ?" 

"  They  were  consoled,  then  ?" 

"  Oh,  yes,  indeed ;  the  principal  consoler  had 
been  there  himself.  He  sang  tenor." 

"  Better  tenor  than  the  average  ?" 

"  Good  deal  better!  The  most  touching,  pa 
thetic  tones  I  ever  heard.  He  sang  the  '  Angel's 
Serenade,'  with  another  man  playing  the  violin. 
It  was  affecting.  One  poor  lady  near  me,  with 


317 


a  sort  of  Eastern  look  about  her,  just  caught  up 
the  child  in  the  pew  by  her  side  and  burst  right 
out  crying.  I  was  all  broke  up,  myself." 

"  That's  a  good  song,"  declared  Ogden.  "  I 
always  like  to  hear  it." 

"  You've  heard  it  before,  then  \  At  St.  Asaph's, 
perhaps  ?" 

"  At  St.  Asaph's  ;  yes." 

"  Well,"  said  Brower,  "  the  man  you  heard 
sing  it  at  St.  Asaph's  was  the  man  I  heard  sing 
it  at  Sioux  Falls." 

"  Yibert !" 

"Vibert." 

George  dropped  his  eyes ;  he  had  no  wish  to 
pursue  the  theme  further.  "  What  have  you 
there  ?"  he  asked.  He  indicated  the  book  that 
Brower  had  left  lying  on  top  of  the  trunk. 

"  Oh,  nothing  special.  It's  just  one  of  those 
cheap  novels.  I  was  merely  running  it  through 
to  see  if  he  really  did  marry  the  right  one  in  the 
end.  Might  have  done  it  in  the  first  place  as 
well  as  not."  He  passed  the  book  to  Ogden 
wrong  side  up.  "  I  guess  it's  yours,  by  rights 
— one  you  left  behind  when  you  moved  out." 

Ogden  turned  the  book  over  and  read  the 
title.  It  was—"  A  False  Start." 

He  started.  He  blushed.  "  Yes,  perhaps  it 
is,"  he  stammered.  He  held  it  awkwardly  in  his 
hand  for  a  moment.  Brower  watched  him  cu 
riously,  yet  sympathetically.  "  Yes,"  Ogden  re- 


318 


peated,  in  a  bold,  firm  voice,  "  it  is  mine."  He 
put  it  in  his  inside  pocket  and  buttoned  his  coat. 

"  Oh,  come,"  cried  Brower,  trying  to  thro\v  a 
veil  of  jocularity  over  his  earnestness,  "  that  isn't 
fair !  I've  got  to  finish  it.  I've  got  to  know 
whether  he  did  or  didn't.  Anyway,  let  me  see 
the  end." 

"  There  is  no  end,"  said  Ogden,  soberly.  "  Or 
if  there  is,  it  has  come." 

"  Then  I  can  only  guess."  Brower  looked  at 
him,  with  a  studious  anxiety  in  his  brown  eyes. 
"  He  made  a  mistake,  sure  enough,  but  I  think 
he  sets  it  right.  Yes,  I  think  he  sets  it  right." 

Ogden's  eyes  sought  the  floor. 

"  No ;  he  abides  by  it." 

"  He  can  set  it  right,"  said  Brower,  gravely ; 
"  and  if  he  can  he  ought." 

"  Not  now  ;  not  after  —  everything.  Let  bad 
enough  alone." 

"  Make  bad  enough  better,"  cried  Brower. 
"  Is  he  the  only  one  to  be  considered  ?  Upon 
my  word,"  he  went  on,  with  a  nervous  attempt 
at  lightness,  "  we  are  getting  these  great  truths 
down  finer  and  finer.  A  couple  of  years  ago 
we  agreed  that  marriage  concerned  but  two 
people ;  now  we  are  finding  that  it  concerns  only 
one.  The  question  simply  is — which  one  3" 

"  The  one  who  would  be  most  exposed  to  in 
jury,"  said  Ogden,  with  a  distant  mournfulness 
in  his  face  and  voice. 


319 


"  There  are  different  kinds  of  injury  ;  there  is 
the  injury  of  commission,  and  there  is  the  injury 
of  omission.  Sometimes  the  last  is  harder — on 
a  woman.  Why  not  let  the  victim  choose  her 
own  particular  woe  ?  Why  not  be  generous 
enough  to  give  her  an  opportunity  ?" 

"  Not  now,"  groaned  Ogden.  "  You  don't 
know.  Not  after  all — that's  happened." 

"  Well,  then,"  continued  Brower,  with  kindly 
perseverance,  "  out  goes  generosity.  Now  bring 
in  selfishness  and  give  that  a  chance.  What  is 
our  hero  going  to  do  ?  Must  there  be  more  sor 
row  for  him,  more  suffering,  more  self -punish 
ment,  and  everlasting  dissatisfaction  generally? 
What  is  he  made  of  ?  Can  he  stand  it  ?  If  so, 
how  long?  And  if  he  does,  why  should  he?" 

"  Brower,  Brower  !"  Ogden  cried  ;  "  not  an 
other  word  if  you  care  for  me  —  if  you  care 
anything  at  all  for  me!"  He  crossed  his 
arms  on  the  table  and  bowed  his  head  upon 
them. 

Brower  passed  his  hand  softly  over  this  head 
and  said  no  more.  He  was  a  patient  husband 
man  ;  he  would  sow  the  good  seed  and  wait  for 
the  harvest. 

Ogden  took  the  book  home  with  him.  He 
fluttered  its  leaves  a  few  times ;  then  he  sat  down 
on  the  edge  of  his  bed  and  read  the  title-page 
for  an  hour.  The  next  night  he  read  it  some 
more  and  dreamed  about  it.  The  next  night  he 


320 


was  reading  it  still,  and  he  lay  awake  thinking 
of  it  until  daylight. 

On  the  following  evening  he  took  the  old,  fa 
miliar  way  to  the  West  Side. 

He  found  Abbie  Brainard  at  home  alone. 
Mary  and  her  husband  had  gone  out,  and  the 
baby  had  been  put  to  bed. 

Abbie  was  sitting  in  the  half-gloom  of  one 
small  lamp ;  the  parlor  was  a  little  room,  and  a 
rather  cheap  and  ugly  one.  But  the  lamp,  thanks 
to  its  beflowered  shade,  was  discreet  and  reti 
cent  in  the  disclosure  of  unprepossessing  detail ; 
besides,  twenty  lamps  would  not  have  had  power 
to  divert  his  thoughts  from  the  channel  through 
which  they  were  now  coursing. 

On  his  entrance  she  started  up  to  light  the 
gas.  She  looked  pale  and  worn,  and  older  than 
he  would  have  believed  possible.  But  he  looked 
older,  too,  and  felt  much  older  than  he  looked. 
The  light  beat  down  upon  his  silvered  hair,  and 
heightened  the  glance  of  pitying  surprise  that 
shone  from  her  eyes. 

In  this  increased  illumination  he  saw  that  fort 
une  had  left  her,  as  well  as  her  youth  and  beauty, 
as  well  as  the  father  whose  life  he  had  felt  to 
make  their  union  impossible,  and  whose  memory 
might  still  keep  it  so.  But  she  herself,  in  her 
own  essence,  was  before  him — the  same  cour 
age,  the  same  resolution,  the  same  tenderness 
and  fidelity.  And  in  him  she  saw  the  only 


321 


man  she  had  ever  seen,  or  had  ever  cared  to 
see. 

To  her,  he  came  as  a  messenger  of  pity  to  heal 
the  wounds  that  knavery  and  scandal  and  vio 
lence  had  hacked  upon  her  quivering  heart.  A 
messenger  of  pity,  yes ;  but  could  he,  by  any  pos 
sible  chance,  find  her  worthy  of  the  pity  that  was 
akin  to  love  ? 

To  him,  she  appeared  as  the  victim  of  his  own 
f aint-heartedness  and  faithlessness.  After  all  that 
he  had  done  to  wring  her  heart,  could  he  vent 
ure  upon  the  crowning  indignity  of  offering  her 
his  tarnished  name  ? 

To  her,  he  stood  there  as  a  tower  of  refuge — 
a  tower  from  whose  summit  the  swathing  fogs 
might  be  cleared  away  by  the  warm  breath  of 
trust  and  confidence,  and  whose  smirched  walls 
—if  smirched  indeed  they  were — might  be  puri 
fied  by  the  tears  of  love  and  the  fingers  of  for- 
getfulness. 

To  himself,  he  lay  before  her  as  a  heap  of 
crumbling  arid  smoke-stained  ruin.  Every  stone 
cried  out  for  the  cleansing  power  of  pity  and 
for  the  firm  and  friendly  hand  that  was  to  rear 
them  all  again  to  their  pristine  use  and  comeli 
ness. 

The  clock  had  struck  eight  as  he  entered ;  it 
was  striking  eleven  as  he  rose  to  go. 

"  Not  yet,"  she  said,  softly.  She  pressed  him 
back  into  the  depths  of  his  great  easy-chair,  and, 

21 


322 


leaning  upon  its  rounded  and  padded  arm,  she 
looked  down  upon  him. 

"  You  take  me,  then,  as  I  am  ?"  he  asked  her, 
soberly. 

"  How  else  do  you  take  me  f " 

He  raised  his  hand  to  his  head.  "  There  will 
be  more  of  them,"  he  said.  "  They  tell  me  I 
shall  be  white  at  forty." 

"  How  many  of  them  are  mine  ?" 

He  pressed  her  hand. 

"  Not  one,  not  one  !  Or,  no,"  he  continued, 
with  a  stronger  pressure,  "  they  are  all  yours — 
do  with  them  as  you  please." 

He  felt  something  warm  drop  on  his  head  and 
trickle  down  his  temples. 

"  Yes,  that  is  the  best  thing  to  do,"  he  said. 
"  To  think,"  he  added,  with  a  tender  seriousness, 
"that  you  might  have  saved  me  from  them — 
from  every  one  !" 

They  were  married  within  a  month,  and  they 
began  their  married  life  in  the  same  house  in 
which  he  had  begun  his  "Western  life  as  a  bache 
lor.  Mrs.  Gore's  kindliness  still  survived,  after 
the  hard  rubs  of  three  years  of  city  life,  and  she 
spread  her  sympathetic  interest  over  her  new 
couple  with  an  unstinted  hand. 

Their  wedding  involved  no  social  celebration, 
unless  we  note  their  participation  in  one  of  a 
series  of  great  public  functions  that  sometimes 


323 


mark  the  early  winter.  This  took  place  in  a 
vast  hall  that  was  luminous  in  ivory  and  gold. 
They  sat  before  a  wide  curved  frame  brilliant 
with  a  myriad  points  of  light,  and  listened  to 
the  united  endeavors  of  many  voices  and  instru 
ments  to  please  the  four  thousand  people  about 
them.  Ogden  and  his  wife  had  taken  places  in 
the  balcony.  They  had  toned  down  existence 
to  a  quiet  gray ;  they  recognized  the  middling- 
ness  of  their  lot.  Cornelia  and  her  husband,  un 
known  to  the  Ogdens,  had  seats  on  the  floor  be 
neath. 

One  box  in  the  two  long,  parallel  rows  re 
mained  vacant  during  the  first  and  second  acts. 
As  the  prelude  to  the  third  act  began  among  the 
violins  the  box  was  claimed.  A  party  of  four 
entered. 

"  There  she  is,"  said  Cornelia  to  herself,  in  her 
place  on  the  main  floor.  "  Just  you  wait.  Burt's 
smart  and  I'm  careful,  and  we  shall  catch  up  to 
you  yet !" 

"  Who  are  those  people  ?"  asked  Abbie,  turn 
ing  towards  her  husband.  "  "Who  is  the  gentle 
man  with  gray  hair?"  She  was  beginning  to 
admire  her  husband's  own. 

The  two  ladies  of  the  party  had  seated  them 
selves  ;  the  two  gentlemen  were  busy  with  their 
own  and  their  companions'  wraps  in  the  back  of 
the  box. 

"  That  is  Mr.  Atwater,  the  architect.    The  lady 


324 


in  yellow  is  his  wife.  The  tall,  brownish  man, 
just  handing  the  glass,  is  Mr.  Ingles ;  he  owns 
the— the  Clifton." 

"And  the  other  lady?"  his  wife  continued. 
She  indicated  a  radiant,  magnificent  young  creat 
ure,  splendid,  like  all  her  mates,  with  the  new  and 
eager  splendor  of  a  long-awaited  opportunity. 
This  new-comer  had  nodded  smilingly  to  many 
people  on  entering — to  her  neighbors  on  either 
side,  to  a  large  dinner-party  that  filled  three  boxes 
across  the  house.  She  seemed  pleased  to  have 
so  many  persons  to  bow  to  so  publicly ;  and  every 
body  whom  she  favored  seemed  equally  glad  of 
an  opportunity  to  return  her  attention. 

Ogden  looked  at  her  and  turned  his  eyes  away. 

"  I — I  have  never  seen  her  before,"  he  said. 
"  I  don't  know  who  she  is,"  he  appeared  to  imply. 

But  he  knew  perfectly  well  who  she  was.  He 
knew  that  she  was  Cecilia  Ingles,  and  his  heart 
was  constricted  by  the  sight  of  her.  It  is  for 
such  a  woman  that  one  man  builds  a  Clifton  and 
that  a  hundred  others  are  martyred  in  it. 


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